BA is also good vs Thrun, Stormbreath Dragon, Gaes Revenge (sb valakut) Reality Smasher, Deaths Shadow, Goyf and gives a plausible game 1 out to Bogles, which is always a thing, in addition to just gaining 4 life in a pinch against aggressive decks which can sometimes be enough to gain an untap step and stabilise. Rest for the Weary was included in the Esper Teachings lists of old, just for the important early lifegain and that card was super narrow. Now we have BA which is just so much better. 2 BA in the main equates to a potential 8-16 life gain (flashbacked with snap) which is a legitimate stabiliser against burn (a huge problem match up). Being a playable mb instant speed edict for only 2 mana puts it over the top.
Also, been personally eyeing Mana Tithe recently. Had some feelsbad moments with Negate and Spell Snare in the wrong match ups. Theorising that Tithe is a slight cross between Snare and Negate, mainly as some protection against nut draws in the first few turns of the match. Either buying me more time to draw into a logic knot if they play around it, or flat out countering them curving out asap. I'm going to test it as a 2-of in place of 2 Helix and see how it performs.
I believe Thrun and Dragon are mainboard by Ponza and I think Skred plays dragon too but I was just listing what BA can deal with, since to me, a control deck needs to be able to deal with anything imo. Against Tarmo and DS, it's not really that bad. It really is just Path 5-6 once they've IoK your original Path. At least BA can hit smasher without taking 5 to the face or card disadvantage. Something that cannot be said of Push or even Path in regards to the discard clause. Also, Bogles, is a real thing too which spot removal ain't gonna touch.
In regards to burn. A lot of the time they have a turn 1 guide. A lot of the time they DON'T have a turn 1 guide but the have a turn 1 Rift Bolt. Fatal Push isn't going to stop that bolt. Blessed Alliance is. Every game plays out differently. We already have 4 Path and every time burn doesn't lead with a turn 1 creature, blessed alliance is going to generally be the better card since it's more versatile. Burn is generally difficult because of the amount of hard to interact with spells on the stack, not particularly their creatures and Fatal Push doesn't deal with this issue at all. I'm also not ignoring their creatures, which I do think generally have to be removed ASAP and that may require fetching a basic on turn 1 to do that. I may also be coming from a slightly different angle arguing my points here as my decks play 3 bolt/Push, 3 path, 2 blessed alliance, so I'm assuming that we're basically playing 6 1 mana removal spells in addition to BA. If I was only playing 4 Path for example, I still generally would side with 2 BA in addition to this, but if I was being honest, I'd probably want to play 2-3 Push in addition to this too.
You're probably right about Tithe, but I'm going to test 2 anyway for experimenting. Tithe isn't anything like Censor IMO. Tithe is there to act as a Spell Snare type card for turns 1,2,3,4 which hits everything from 1 drop zoo, expedition map to 2 drop Merfolk, zombie infestation, cathartic reunion, to 3 drop Blood Moon, Lilly, Karn, As Foretold, Gideon to 4 drop Nahiri/Planeswalkers. Anything more that that like 5 drop Ad Nauseam or Through the Breach is gravy. My reasoning for testing is that sometimes I;m just that one turn behind before I die if they curve out perfectly. And theoretically, Tithe will either: a) catch their money play, or b) make them play around Tithe which allows me to EOT TT or Charm, buying me more time to find a logic knot or cryptic which WILL counter their money play. Insurance if you will. Censor is 1 mana too slow for this so they cannot be compared. Again, I'm coming from the perspective that I'm removing 2 lightning helix to test this, so I'm not replacing any hard counters for Tithe and lightning helix isn't exactly brilliant after turn 3 or 4 either so I don't think I'm losing out too much to test this swap. I feel my late game is quite powerful with logic knot, cryptic, mystical teachings and sphinx rev and mainly looking for a slight leg up in the first 1-4 turns of the match against the most god-like of draws if that makes sense.
I do agree with your logic overall but am offering my perspective on some card choices and thanks
I have never in my life cast a removal spell on a turn one play from burn. Ever. Goblin guide, i'm almost 100% to let swing at least twice because i'm willing to spend two life for another card on turn two any time. For monastery swiftspear, i'm going to remove it once they invest a turn into trying to make it hit significantly.
How do you get rid of the creatures efficiently if you're not killing them T1? Do you leave in Verdict against Burn? When do you start removing the creatures, and do you prioritize countering the non-creatures spells over killing the creatures?
Not trying to throw shade, I just need all the perspective I can get when it comes to playing against Burn.
I have never in my life cast a removal spell on a turn one play from burn. Ever. Goblin guide, i'm almost 100% to let swing at least twice because i'm willing to spend two life for another card on turn two any time. For monastery swiftspear, i'm going to remove it once they invest a turn into trying to make it hit significantly.
How do you get rid of the creatures efficiently if you're not killing them T1? Do you leave in Verdict against Burn? When do you start removing the creatures, and do you prioritize countering the non-creatures spells over killing the creatures?
Not trying to throw shade, I just need all the perspective I can get when it comes to playing against Burn.
I mostly play on Modo so I tend to play against burn and tron a lot. Against burn I usually end the game with 1-4 life. I board to lower my curve and leave in 2 of my 3 sweepers with six 1 mana removal spells and bring in both BA's (I use them for the life not usually the sacrifice).
How you deal with their creatures depends on what cards you have in hand and what creature they play. If I have a fatal push I will always kill a guide t1 after the trigger, if its a swiftspear you want to try to wait till they invest in it with a couple of spells. Path is different, you don't want to give them the land until they already have 2-3 or only 1-2 cards in hand otherwise you are just helping out their plan. So with path you have to weigh how much damage you will take off the creatures vs how much more you will take from spells.
As an example if it's a swiftspear and they just invested 2-3 spells in it then path is probably worth it. If its two swift spears and just 1-2 spells then again path might be worth it depending on cards in hand and lands in play. If it's a goblin guide then probably not worth it until they have more lands.
Every spell in burn (or highly aggro strategies of any kind) matters and the 1 extra card they draw off path could be the difference between you winning or loosing. The reverse could be said about they draws off goblin guide though.
Edit: (spelling)
Edit: I forgot to mention about fetching. I never take damage from a dual land to kill a creature against burn. I always fetch for basic or wait.
Read a great quote from an article that's somewhat relevant to the last 2 pages of this thread:
One of the more striking developments of 2016 was the emergence of a “post-fact” world, in which virtually all authoritative information sources are challenged by contrary facts of dubious quality and provenance. In a world without gatekeepers, there is no reason to think that good information will win out over bad.
It was one thing when there were no published results outside of Wafo's 1 GP. These days, there are plenty of results:
...to choose from. Plenty of these are from TCG States; it's not all MODO data. Not that I've ever really heard of pros running "MODO Only" lists like some people claim. Building your deck for the "scrub rounds" is a pretty sad way to go about winning a tournament, and the winner's circle is the same clusterfck of Tier 1/2 decks whether it's MODO or paper:
All I'm saying is, give the new cards a chance. Random FNM opponents tend to be pretty mediocre at Magic; with all the hundreds upon hundreds of hours of testing people on this thread claim, if you're not competing in your state championships by now, you're probably doing something wrong. Noone's saying Wafo's constantly rotating lists are gospel, but if you're still running the same 56 sacred cows + 4 fillers from 2014 then something's not right.
Why do we not run Murderous Cut? Also Quicken seems like a savage move in this deck. Thoughts?
Redundancy with Path and Supreme. Also we don't fill up the graveyard fast enough for that spell to necessarily be worth it. And once you use it you probably can't use Logic Knot.
All I'm saying is, give the new cards a chance. Random FNM opponents tend to be pretty mediocre at Magic; with all the hundreds upon hundreds of hours of testing people on this thread claim, if you're not competing in your state championships by now, you're probably doing something wrong. Noone's saying Wafo's constantly rotating lists are gospel, but if you're still running the same 56 sacred cows + 4 fillers from 2014 then something's not right.
If nothing else matters to you, consider this: I went 13-6 in challenge event rounds last weekend with my 75, and four of those losses over the weekend were against the exact same opponent. I would argue that the challenge events, particularly on Sunday, include comparable opponents to the later day 1 or earlier day 2 rounds of a GP. We have had a 12-2 and two 11-4 GP results (piotrowiak and IDK if the two 11-4's are in the thread as regulars), and all three of those results were on very traditional builds--one on secure the wastes, two of them on WSZ, all on fairly similar sideboards. Remember that there are very few players actually on this deck--if we take the thread as a sample size, we have what? Maybe six players who've been on it seriously for more than a year? And most of them have good results or have had good results grinding regional and local events?
As far as BA vs Push: they do different things. Push is removal spells 5 and 6. Blessed alliance is a card advantage tool, that sometimes does it by eating creatures and burn spells, and sometimes just is a one for one in sticky situations. Blessed alliance is a card I prefer in all of the midrangy matchups (bant eldrazi, merfolk, jund, death's shadow anything) because it forces them to apply more pressure than they otherwise would, which in turn leads to verdicts being better. You ask "why is BA better in any matchup other than burn?", I ask you "Why would you think push is better than blessed alliance against anything except burn?". Push is a 1 mana removal spell. It's very efficient and kills a lot. Blessed alliance is a 4 mana utility spell. Sure, push is going to come down faster. Blessed alliance is more powerful in a vacuum, more powerful on turn four, and more powerful on any turn of the game other than turn one. We're in the business of leveraging a mana advantage to cast powerful spells to bury our opponent in value, blessed alliance is a 4 mana spell with a 2 mana mode available to try and help out the early game. And yes, I 100% keep in some verdicts against burn, and if you don't do that you're being silly or oversideboarding.
Yes, I am a local area mod. WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE
Primary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
All I'm saying is, give the new cards a chance. Random FNM opponents tend to be pretty mediocre at Magic; with all the hundreds upon hundreds of hours of testing people on this thread claim, if you're not competing in your state championships by now, you're probably doing something wrong. Noone's saying Wafo's constantly rotating lists are gospel, but if you're still running the same 56 sacred cows + 4 fillers from 2014 then something's not right.
If nothing else matters to you, consider this: I went 13-6 in challenge event rounds last weekend with my 75, and four of those losses over the weekend were against the exact same opponent. I would argue that the challenge events, particularly on Sunday, include comparable opponents to the later day 1 or earlier day 2 rounds of a GP. We have had a 12-2 and two 11-4 GP results (piotrowiak and IDK if the two 11-4's are in the thread as regulars), and all three of those results were on very traditional builds--one on secure the wastes, two of them on WSZ, all on fairly similar sideboards. Remember that there are very few players actually on this deck--if we take the thread as a sample size, we have what? Maybe six players who've been on it seriously for more than a year? And most of them have good results or have had good results grinding regional and local events?
As far as BA vs Push: they do different things. Push is removal spells 5 and 6. Blessed alliance is a card advantage tool, that sometimes does it by eating creatures and burn spells, and sometimes just is a one for one in sticky situations. Blessed alliance is a card I prefer in all of the midrangy matchups (bant eldrazi, merfolk, jund, death's shadow anything) because it forces them to apply more pressure than they otherwise would, which in turn leads to verdicts being better. You ask "why is BA better in any matchup other than burn?", I ask you "Why would you think push is better than blessed alliance against anything except burn?". Push is a 1 mana removal spell. It's very efficient and kills a lot. Blessed alliance is a 4 mana utility spell. Sure, push is going to come down faster. Blessed alliance is more powerful in a vacuum, more powerful on turn four, and more powerful on any turn of the game other than turn one. We're in the business of leveraging a mana advantage to cast powerful spells to bury our opponent in value, blessed alliance is a 4 mana spell with a 2 mana mode available to try and help out the early game. And yes, I 100% keep in some verdicts against burn, and if you don't do that you're being silly or oversideboarding.
I want my removal spells to do what they need to do - kill the thing I want to kill at tempo advantage. Fatal Push is many many times better than Blessed Alliance for this. I'm not looking to have my point and click removal also sometimes give me some advantage - that's what my dedicate CA cards are for (Esper Charm, Cryptic, Snapcaster, if you run TT (I run Scour the Laboratory), etc.). It's called Division of Labor in economics and produces better results imho. You all ready have 4 mana utility/CA removal - your sweepers. You don't need more in an otherwise all ready clunky deck. I've always built control decks around mana efficiency - I'm going to play more spells than my opponent due to their efficiency. I'm going to kill your creature for 1 and 2 mana and then draw cards for 2, 3 or 4. I'm going to leverage my lands into additional cards (Celestial, cycling lands, etc.) and utility. Blessed Alliance is a fine SB card for its versatility; it's why I run one, but I would never run BA MB over Push in modern.
For anyone wondering I run;
4 Push
3 Path
1 Condemn (will be 4th path again once DS dies down)
2 Gideon of the Trials
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Cast Out (I suppose this is my "versatile answer" that doubles as delirium and catch-all permanent answer)
Being able to take care of a 3, 4 or 5 mana investment for 1 mana allowing you to keep up a counter or play a CA card is what the deck needs to do imho. Path and Push allow us to most efficiently. We need to leverage the turn cycle to be successful.
I think your comment about the lack of results of a lot of people in this thread is a little unfair.
I've never attended any state championship event, but I've never tried. The problem is lack of ambition, IMO.
That being said, I do think fatal push is better than blessed alliance (mainboard) in a "regular" metagame. The major reason for this is because push is miles better against death shadow.
I think there are more than six people playing this deck, but I'd be shocked if there were even triple digits of people seriously playing it.
I want my removal spells to do one thing: kill things dead.
I don't care about tempo advantage, I care about living through the early/mid game. I care about killing creatures with CMC > 4, too.
Cryptic is, by defintion, not a card advantage tool. It is to counterspells with BA is to removal spells. It answers one thing cleanly, and gives some additional value (usually by drawing a card), where as blessed alliance answers one thing cleaning and provides 4 life worth of value.
IMO, mana efficiency is kind of overstated. Sure, its nice to be efficient, but I'd rather be pushing towards an end goal, regardless of efficiency. Think twice is garbage in terms of mana efficiency by itself, (though it does let us fill in the cracks), and honestly, so is cryptic, usually.
Thats not really the point though, because both of those cards are integral to the deck's function.
I won't totally expand this into saying that BA is essential to the deck's function, but it is a vastly preferable card to be playing, IMO. It happens that there are a lot of discard spells, and a lot of really cheap threats, both of which are found in aggressive decks, as thus, fatal push comes out ahead. That being said, it wouldn't take much of a metagame shift to change that.
As an aside, please stop playing condemns specifically against death's shadow.
Seriously, this card is massively overstated in effectiveness.
What is more likely to happen:
1) you get a massive blow out by condemning an attacking creature and having the splash damage kill one or more shadows.
2) they cast a discard spell (of which they run 8+) precombat and you can't just kill a creature on demand.
I'll give you a hint, its not the first one.
You're ignoring my point that BA isn't a removal spell first, it's actually a card advantage spell first and foremost. It's the same thing as shadow of doubt and remand, where it's good in some matchups and actually nets us resources in others, except that it nets us resources in the form of life, and ALWAYS nets us a card's worth of value.
Nothing you're saying is necessarily incorrect, but magic isn't entirely theory (ironically, usually this is the argument other people try to make to me). There are some realities to the format that you have to consider:
--life total is a much more precious resource than in other formats
--people "do" just as much stuff as in legacy (efficiency of spells), but fewer of the spells they cast are actually impactful (cards are less powerful for their costs)
Finally, I directly contest your point that control decks have to pick and choose what they want to beat. I would argue that the one true strength of control in modern IS the fact that the power of white hate cards means we CAN have appropriate reactive answers to almost any deck in the format without having to overload for any particular matchup. This has a side effect against decks like Death's Shadow whatever, which are vulnerable to more kinds of hate than many other decks in the format, so we have even more game-ending tools against the current "best deck" in the format than most other high tier decks can dream of, and we do it without warping our actual decklists. And yes, it means you do play a bit of a prison game and a bit less of a counterspells and card advantage game in most matchups, but hey--it's the play pattern that got miracles banned. That's good enough for me.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Yes, I am a local area mod. WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE
Primary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
I've been following this thread for the last 10 pages or so. I was on UW and then Esper through Eldrazi winter and the following season. I left the country for 8 months and played mostly Abzan and EDH online, but now I'm getting ready to return home in about a week and I'm very excited to get back into Esper. I've begun practicing a mostly stock list on Xmage, and holy crap guys, we are really well positioned right now it seems.
As for the topic of the last few pages, I have no idea how BA can be a consideration over fatal push. Back when I was playing we had 4 path and 2 condemn just to maximize the 1 mana remove options. The idea that a 2 Mana spell that's only actually better as a 4 Mana spell somehow replaces a 2 Mana spell is insane. By the time we get to 4 Mana, we have better things to be doing. I just don't see it. Sure, run some in the board if you like, but just like cryptic isn't a replacement for negate or snare, BA is NOT a replacement for path or push.
Hey... I have an answer to every single strategy in the format in my starting 60. Whether I draw it or not is a different story
Yup, me too. But that doesn't mean much: if I need to dedicate 4-5-6 slots against a certain strategy and I have only space to play two cards, then I won't really call it "it's covered!" ^^
Thank comedy Mystical Teachings exists, otherwise I'd be praying for dat topdeck miracle erry time!
I geek that we're forgetting that each of us are playing a deck that's tuned for separate metas. We have the core of the deck, plus flex slots. And while most decks plays 5-7 1cmc removals, Amalek plays only 4. BA doesn't "replace" push in his build any more than leyline does. He plays BA primarily because its a flexible spell, that it dobles as removal is just bonus. The same way that leyline protects against burn, and incidentally protects against mindrot.
Cryptic is the same: a 4cmc counter is just bad, its the flexibility that makes it valuable.
Blessed alliance is not slotted in as a removal spell in my build. It's a flex slot that has scalable power. If I wanted six removal spells, I'd play two fatal pushes. I don't want six removal spells. Against most decks in the current format where stacking lots of removal spells is good, I'd rather just cast a verdict, hence 5 wraths in the 75.
I won a match against taking turns because of blessed alliance, because the third mode is really good against gigadrowse being used to try and buy them a combo turn. Flexibility. Power level.
Yes, I am a local area mod. WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE
Primary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
Fatal Push is way overrated. You can run any 1- or 2-mana removal and the result is largely the same, e.g. Fatal Push, Condemn, BA. U/W control (which is Tier 1) is prove of that. Against Burn however the lifegain is undeniably a huge advantage. Since Burn is Tier 1 and a very popular deck in GPs anyway, because its so easy to play I rate the life gain higher than some Tier 2 threats like Banal, Leonin, and whatnot.
Exactly. We're basically uw control w esper charm. And the black for charm is already straining, push adds to that strain. The lifeloss counts, you know.
Push is really good. But its not an automatic inclusion.
BA is strictly worse than Push in the MB, at least in a open meta. I understand Amalek's point about it not primarily being removal, but when you go into a game against an unknown deck, I would rather have a Push in my hand than a BA any day. 80%, if not more, of the decks you are going to face when playing Magic are creature-based. Lands and creatures, maybe a few spells. The other 15-20% will be combo/control, and we already have the tools to deal with those (Negate, Logic Knot, etc.) I'm not saying Blessed Alliance is bad, I play it in my SB. But as it eats up slots that would be meant for removal, I eschew it from the main. We need more removal than just four Path.
Exactly. We're basically uw control w esper charm. And the black for charm is already straining, push adds to that strain. The lifeloss counts, you know.
If you say so, then it's clear that you've never played UW in your life. I'll repeat: UW Tap-Out and Esper Draw-Go are two different archetypes.
Nailed it. Saying that Esper Draw Go is Uw with a B splash for Echarm is like saying that pasta is lowkey rice. It's sorta UNTRUE
How is the difference in playstyle remotely relevant to my point of manabase? Of course a sorcery speed draw engine plays differently. Hence the black slash, enabling draw-go... Come on guys.
Edit: Also, unless one has done the math or collected the data (an thus can _prove_ a statement), one is simply stating ones opinion on the matter. As long as one is nothing more than opinionated, one should, perhaps, respect other peoples opinion on the matter. And we all should strive to be civil and polite.
Also, been personally eyeing Mana Tithe recently. Had some feelsbad moments with Negate and Spell Snare in the wrong match ups. Theorising that Tithe is a slight cross between Snare and Negate, mainly as some protection against nut draws in the first few turns of the match. Either buying me more time to draw into a logic knot if they play around it, or flat out countering them curving out asap. I'm going to test it as a 2-of in place of 2 Helix and see how it performs.
WMMT5dx: Car - RK Coupe Track - Hakone Outbound
I believe Thrun and Dragon are mainboard by Ponza and I think Skred plays dragon too but I was just listing what BA can deal with, since to me, a control deck needs to be able to deal with anything imo. Against Tarmo and DS, it's not really that bad. It really is just Path 5-6 once they've IoK your original Path. At least BA can hit smasher without taking 5 to the face or card disadvantage. Something that cannot be said of Push or even Path in regards to the discard clause. Also, Bogles, is a real thing too which spot removal ain't gonna touch.
In regards to burn. A lot of the time they have a turn 1 guide. A lot of the time they DON'T have a turn 1 guide but the have a turn 1 Rift Bolt. Fatal Push isn't going to stop that bolt. Blessed Alliance is. Every game plays out differently. We already have 4 Path and every time burn doesn't lead with a turn 1 creature, blessed alliance is going to generally be the better card since it's more versatile. Burn is generally difficult because of the amount of hard to interact with spells on the stack, not particularly their creatures and Fatal Push doesn't deal with this issue at all. I'm also not ignoring their creatures, which I do think generally have to be removed ASAP and that may require fetching a basic on turn 1 to do that. I may also be coming from a slightly different angle arguing my points here as my decks play 3 bolt/Push, 3 path, 2 blessed alliance, so I'm assuming that we're basically playing 6 1 mana removal spells in addition to BA. If I was only playing 4 Path for example, I still generally would side with 2 BA in addition to this, but if I was being honest, I'd probably want to play 2-3 Push in addition to this too.
You're probably right about Tithe, but I'm going to test 2 anyway for experimenting. Tithe isn't anything like Censor IMO. Tithe is there to act as a Spell Snare type card for turns 1,2,3,4 which hits everything from 1 drop zoo, expedition map to 2 drop Merfolk, zombie infestation, cathartic reunion, to 3 drop Blood Moon, Lilly, Karn, As Foretold, Gideon to 4 drop Nahiri/Planeswalkers. Anything more that that like 5 drop Ad Nauseam or Through the Breach is gravy. My reasoning for testing is that sometimes I;m just that one turn behind before I die if they curve out perfectly. And theoretically, Tithe will either: a) catch their money play, or b) make them play around Tithe which allows me to EOT TT or Charm, buying me more time to find a logic knot or cryptic which WILL counter their money play. Insurance if you will. Censor is 1 mana too slow for this so they cannot be compared. Again, I'm coming from the perspective that I'm removing 2 lightning helix to test this, so I'm not replacing any hard counters for Tithe and lightning helix isn't exactly brilliant after turn 3 or 4 either so I don't think I'm losing out too much to test this swap. I feel my late game is quite powerful with logic knot, cryptic, mystical teachings and sphinx rev and mainly looking for a slight leg up in the first 1-4 turns of the match against the most god-like of draws if that makes sense.
I do agree with your logic overall but am offering my perspective on some card choices and thanks
WMMT5dx: Car - RK Coupe Track - Hakone Outbound
How do you get rid of the creatures efficiently if you're not killing them T1? Do you leave in Verdict against Burn? When do you start removing the creatures, and do you prioritize countering the non-creatures spells over killing the creatures?
Not trying to throw shade, I just need all the perspective I can get when it comes to playing against Burn.
UWB Esper Draw-Go Control (clicky)
UW Azorius Control (clicky)
Currently pursuing a degree in Biochemistry.
EDH: I've decided I don't like multiplayer formats.
I mostly play on Modo so I tend to play against burn and tron a lot. Against burn I usually end the game with 1-4 life. I board to lower my curve and leave in 2 of my 3 sweepers with six 1 mana removal spells and bring in both BA's (I use them for the life not usually the sacrifice).
How you deal with their creatures depends on what cards you have in hand and what creature they play. If I have a fatal push I will always kill a guide t1 after the trigger, if its a swiftspear you want to try to wait till they invest in it with a couple of spells. Path is different, you don't want to give them the land until they already have 2-3 or only 1-2 cards in hand otherwise you are just helping out their plan. So with path you have to weigh how much damage you will take off the creatures vs how much more you will take from spells.
As an example if it's a swiftspear and they just invested 2-3 spells in it then path is probably worth it. If its two swift spears and just 1-2 spells then again path might be worth it depending on cards in hand and lands in play. If it's a goblin guide then probably not worth it until they have more lands.
Every spell in burn (or highly aggro strategies of any kind) matters and the 1 extra card they draw off path could be the difference between you winning or loosing. The reverse could be said about they draws off goblin guide though.
Edit: (spelling)
Edit: I forgot to mention about fetching. I never take damage from a dual land to kill a creature against burn. I always fetch for basic or wait.
It was one thing when there were no published results outside of Wafo's 1 GP. These days, there are plenty of results:
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/modern-esper-control-32587#online
...to choose from. Plenty of these are from TCG States; it's not all MODO data. Not that I've ever really heard of pros running "MODO Only" lists like some people claim. Building your deck for the "scrub rounds" is a pretty sad way to go about winning a tournament, and the winner's circle is the same clusterfck of Tier 1/2 decks whether it's MODO or paper:
http://modernnexus.com/metagame-breakdown-feb-17/
All I'm saying is, give the new cards a chance. Random FNM opponents tend to be pretty mediocre at Magic; with all the hundreds upon hundreds of hours of testing people on this thread claim, if you're not competing in your state championships by now, you're probably doing something wrong. Noone's saying Wafo's constantly rotating lists are gospel, but if you're still running the same 56 sacred cows + 4 fillers from 2014 then something's not right.
UWR Control
BR Hollow One
Redundancy with Path and Supreme. Also we don't fill up the graveyard fast enough for that spell to necessarily be worth it. And once you use it you probably can't use Logic Knot.
If nothing else matters to you, consider this: I went 13-6 in challenge event rounds last weekend with my 75, and four of those losses over the weekend were against the exact same opponent. I would argue that the challenge events, particularly on Sunday, include comparable opponents to the later day 1 or earlier day 2 rounds of a GP. We have had a 12-2 and two 11-4 GP results (piotrowiak and IDK if the two 11-4's are in the thread as regulars), and all three of those results were on very traditional builds--one on secure the wastes, two of them on WSZ, all on fairly similar sideboards. Remember that there are very few players actually on this deck--if we take the thread as a sample size, we have what? Maybe six players who've been on it seriously for more than a year? And most of them have good results or have had good results grinding regional and local events?
As far as BA vs Push: they do different things. Push is removal spells 5 and 6. Blessed alliance is a card advantage tool, that sometimes does it by eating creatures and burn spells, and sometimes just is a one for one in sticky situations. Blessed alliance is a card I prefer in all of the midrangy matchups (bant eldrazi, merfolk, jund, death's shadow anything) because it forces them to apply more pressure than they otherwise would, which in turn leads to verdicts being better. You ask "why is BA better in any matchup other than burn?", I ask you "Why would you think push is better than blessed alliance against anything except burn?". Push is a 1 mana removal spell. It's very efficient and kills a lot. Blessed alliance is a 4 mana utility spell. Sure, push is going to come down faster. Blessed alliance is more powerful in a vacuum, more powerful on turn four, and more powerful on any turn of the game other than turn one. We're in the business of leveraging a mana advantage to cast powerful spells to bury our opponent in value, blessed alliance is a 4 mana spell with a 2 mana mode available to try and help out the early game. And yes, I 100% keep in some verdicts against burn, and if you don't do that you're being silly or oversideboarding.
Yes, I am a local area mod.WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVEPrimary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
I want my removal spells to do what they need to do - kill the thing I want to kill at tempo advantage. Fatal Push is many many times better than Blessed Alliance for this. I'm not looking to have my point and click removal also sometimes give me some advantage - that's what my dedicate CA cards are for (Esper Charm, Cryptic, Snapcaster, if you run TT (I run Scour the Laboratory), etc.). It's called Division of Labor in economics and produces better results imho. You all ready have 4 mana utility/CA removal - your sweepers. You don't need more in an otherwise all ready clunky deck. I've always built control decks around mana efficiency - I'm going to play more spells than my opponent due to their efficiency. I'm going to kill your creature for 1 and 2 mana and then draw cards for 2, 3 or 4. I'm going to leverage my lands into additional cards (Celestial, cycling lands, etc.) and utility. Blessed Alliance is a fine SB card for its versatility; it's why I run one, but I would never run BA MB over Push in modern.
For anyone wondering I run;
4 Push
3 Path
1 Condemn (will be 4th path again once DS dies down)
2 Gideon of the Trials
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Cast Out (I suppose this is my "versatile answer" that doubles as delirium and catch-all permanent answer)
Being able to take care of a 3, 4 or 5 mana investment for 1 mana allowing you to keep up a counter or play a CA card is what the deck needs to do imho. Path and Push allow us to most efficiently. We need to leverage the turn cycle to be successful.
I've never attended any state championship event, but I've never tried. The problem is lack of ambition, IMO.
That being said, I do think fatal push is better than blessed alliance (mainboard) in a "regular" metagame. The major reason for this is because push is miles better against death shadow.
I think there are more than six people playing this deck, but I'd be shocked if there were even triple digits of people seriously playing it.
I want my removal spells to do one thing: kill things dead.
I don't care about tempo advantage, I care about living through the early/mid game. I care about killing creatures with CMC > 4, too.
Cryptic is, by defintion, not a card advantage tool. It is to counterspells with BA is to removal spells. It answers one thing cleanly, and gives some additional value (usually by drawing a card), where as blessed alliance answers one thing cleaning and provides 4 life worth of value.
IMO, mana efficiency is kind of overstated. Sure, its nice to be efficient, but I'd rather be pushing towards an end goal, regardless of efficiency. Think twice is garbage in terms of mana efficiency by itself, (though it does let us fill in the cracks), and honestly, so is cryptic, usually.
Thats not really the point though, because both of those cards are integral to the deck's function.
I won't totally expand this into saying that BA is essential to the deck's function, but it is a vastly preferable card to be playing, IMO. It happens that there are a lot of discard spells, and a lot of really cheap threats, both of which are found in aggressive decks, as thus, fatal push comes out ahead. That being said, it wouldn't take much of a metagame shift to change that.
As an aside, please stop playing condemns specifically against death's shadow.
Seriously, this card is massively overstated in effectiveness.
What is more likely to happen:
1) you get a massive blow out by condemning an attacking creature and having the splash damage kill one or more shadows.
2) they cast a discard spell (of which they run 8+) precombat and you can't just kill a creature on demand.
I'll give you a hint, its not the first one.
Nothing you're saying is necessarily incorrect, but magic isn't entirely theory (ironically, usually this is the argument other people try to make to me). There are some realities to the format that you have to consider:
--life total is a much more precious resource than in other formats
--people "do" just as much stuff as in legacy (efficiency of spells), but fewer of the spells they cast are actually impactful (cards are less powerful for their costs)
Finally, I directly contest your point that control decks have to pick and choose what they want to beat. I would argue that the one true strength of control in modern IS the fact that the power of white hate cards means we CAN have appropriate reactive answers to almost any deck in the format without having to overload for any particular matchup. This has a side effect against decks like Death's Shadow whatever, which are vulnerable to more kinds of hate than many other decks in the format, so we have even more game-ending tools against the current "best deck" in the format than most other high tier decks can dream of, and we do it without warping our actual decklists. And yes, it means you do play a bit of a prison game and a bit less of a counterspells and card advantage game in most matchups, but hey--it's the play pattern that got miracles banned. That's good enough for me.
Yes, I am a local area mod.WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVEPrimary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
As for the topic of the last few pages, I have no idea how BA can be a consideration over fatal push. Back when I was playing we had 4 path and 2 condemn just to maximize the 1 mana remove options. The idea that a 2 Mana spell that's only actually better as a 4 Mana spell somehow replaces a 2 Mana spell is insane. By the time we get to 4 Mana, we have better things to be doing. I just don't see it. Sure, run some in the board if you like, but just like cryptic isn't a replacement for negate or snare, BA is NOT a replacement for path or push.
Hey... I have an answer to every single strategy in the format in my starting 60. Whether I draw it or not is a different story
WMMT5dx: Car - RK Coupe Track - Hakone Outbound
Thank comedy Mystical Teachings exists, otherwise I'd be praying for dat topdeck miracle erry time!
WMMT5dx: Car - RK Coupe Track - Hakone Outbound
Cryptic is the same: a 4cmc counter is just bad, its the flexibility that makes it valuable.
Blessed alliance is not slotted in as a removal spell in my build. It's a flex slot that has scalable power. If I wanted six removal spells, I'd play two fatal pushes. I don't want six removal spells. Against most decks in the current format where stacking lots of removal spells is good, I'd rather just cast a verdict, hence 5 wraths in the 75.
I won a match against taking turns because of blessed alliance, because the third mode is really good against gigadrowse being used to try and buy them a combo turn. Flexibility. Power level.
Yes, I am a local area mod.WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVEPrimary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
Exactly. We're basically uw control w esper charm. And the black for charm is already straining, push adds to that strain. The lifeloss counts, you know.
Push is really good. But its not an automatic inclusion.
W[mana]U[/mana]BEsper Control
Nailed it. Saying that Esper Draw Go is Uw with a B splash for Echarm is like saying that pasta is lowkey rice. It's sorta UNTRUE
W[mana]U[/mana]BEsper Control
Edit: Also, unless one has done the math or collected the data (an thus can _prove_ a statement), one is simply stating ones opinion on the matter. As long as one is nothing more than opinionated, one should, perhaps, respect other peoples opinion on the matter. And we all should strive to be civil and polite.
Cheers.