MTG Salvation

I don't know what's the deck you're referring to, to be fair. Is it some kind of Midrange or a Combo? I tested the list against Electrodominance Living End, and won both sets 2-0, without any effort. But it seems to be a different deck from the one you mentioned. Rhino tokens aren't an issue for sure, given the fact that either counterspells or a later Archmage's Charm invalidate the card doing 1x1, and you can still rely on Fatal Push - Snapcaster Mage - Fatal Push, or simply double removal, or Cryptic Command (either counter it or bounce token and draw). I mean, we've got all the weapons.

The list presents 19 blue mana lands, and it plays 4 Opt as cantrips. Doing the math, it's more than enough blue sources (and my testing sessions confirm that there is no issue with colored mana). Are you sure that you didn't fetch for non-Island even when unwanted? You can certainly cut the Godless Shrine, one Island and add one Watery Grave and one Hallowed Fountain (considering the original list), but I don't see why we should.

Anyway, seems like a pretty random match-up.

EDIT. And I see you only played mainboard games, while counterspells in the sideboard should be the real deal against them

Yup, the deck's kind of his brew atm. It runs Dreadhorde Arcanist and at the moment was running some Monastery Swiftspears, Atarka's Command and some number of Become Immense so he also just caught me unaware in some of the games. The deck has reach. I agree that this kind of matchup should improve post-board. I never fetched non-blue source, but sometimes you just draw the basics or Blast Zones (which were almost dead cards here, while Field of Ruin can almost always in a pinch T3 go fetch an Island at least), and there was some pressure on Pushes and Paths to stem the bleeding from little critters. I do recall a major punt of mine where I left an untapped swamp to draw into an Archmage's Charm which would have most probably won me a game and I couldn't cast, so I guess it should have been a 2-4, plus the punts that I did not recognize. I did run 1 Gearhulk 1 FoF, but never drew the FoF so it made no difference. There was 1 game in which I opted into gearhulk with 5 lands and died when it would have let me stabilize, so most games were in fact close. I'll let you know if I get some more games, but I doubt it'll be so for a couple of weeks.

Oh, okay. I thought it was more of a Combo with a B-plan consisting of beatdown. Sort of experimental brew, anyway.

Thanks for giving it a shot! References are always a good thing to have.

Could someone please post a non-expiring link to the new discord?

Seriously, this thing with the discord invites is what stops it from directly replacing all forums around. I hope they add an option to be able to browse through servers or something. When is salvation going down?

Quote from Lueseto »

When is salvation going down?

Quote: MTG Salvation will be closing on July 8th, 2019.

https://discord.gg/U9ZSd9

Why am I the only one who's not super impressed with Blast Zone? It's so inefficient to kill anything that doesn't have 1-CMC

Quote from chaos021 »

Why am I the only one who's not super impressed with Blast Zone? It's so inefficient to kill anything that doesn't have 1-CMC

I find them pretty greedy, too. It's a good card no doubt, and a great sweeper/removal the opponent can't interact with (man I have lost so many matches vs. a resolved Liliana...). However, I totally dislike it in a 3 color deck where you want to support cryptics, charms, logic knots and so on. Due to that I even considered cutting Field of Ruin, but it is a necessary evil I think (to have at least some game vs. Tron and Valakut).

You certainly can't play Field of Ruin and Blast Zone at the same time. Other than that, you also need to play a lifted amount of basic lands to make them work (like, the second Plains is too greedy for sure). I still find Blast Zone incredibly good, and would never jam this deck without at least two of them.

Another question for the Esperites: Have any of you considered adding some number of Thoughtseize to the main deck? If it's bad (as I assume most will say), why is it bad?

Traditionally speaking, the deck has never wanted mainboard discard because you're trying to get to turn 20 before winning with rev > zenith.
Things are a little bit different these days, but fundamentally, you are still trying to play a long game.
The nature of playing a pile of lands over everyone else in the format means you need to draw that many more cards in order to balance out on interaction for their threats.
The more cards you add that neither draw cards nor (reliably) answer something, the more you stress the card advantage you already have.
The nature of planeswalkers means that discard is probably better now than its ever been, but you are still fundamentally trying to play a long game, which discard doesn't work well with, not to mention the fact that thoughtseize causes lifeloss (while iok/duress miss a lot of important things we're scared of), discard doesnt require them to spend mana, and lets them spend their turn still deploying a threat, and of course the fact that a lot of the format is simply not that weak to discard, especially discard thats not on turn 1/2.
Its better in the board because its functional (but not great) in a lot of matchups (shadow, tron, etc) where some of our interaction is very bad (cryptic command, supreme verdict) so making the swap lets us keep the same amount of interaction post board.

Invite to discord expired, someone hook me up with a new one?

Quote from Cody_X »

Traditionally speaking, the deck has never wanted mainboard discard because you're trying to get to turn 20 before winning with rev > zenith.
Things are a little bit different these days, but fundamentally, you are still trying to play a long game.
The nature of playing a pile of lands over everyone else in the format means you need to draw that many more cards in order to balance out on interaction for their threats.
The more cards you add that neither draw cards nor (reliably) answer something, the more you stress the card advantage you already have.
The nature of planeswalkers means that discard is probably better now than its ever been, but you are still fundamentally trying to play a long game, which discard doesn't work well with, not to mention the fact that thoughtseize causes lifeloss (while iok/duress miss a lot of important things we're scared of), discard doesnt require them to spend mana, and lets them spend their turn still deploying a threat, and of course the fact that a lot of the format is simply not that weak to discard, especially discard thats not on turn 1/2.
Its better in the board because its functional (but not great) in a lot of matchups (shadow, tron, etc) where some of our interaction is very bad (cryptic command, supreme verdict) so making the swap lets us keep the same amount of interaction post board.

This 100%. In my humble opinion it is always preferrable to hold up mana for your counterspells. Thus, you do not want to "waste" mana in the early turns just for taking one card from their hand. You cannot fight their top deck this way. Given we are a slow deck, it is close to meaningless taking a card from their hand since they can redraw easily. Oh, and it is an even worse topdeck later in the game. In this phase you want to be using your Cryptics and PWs IMO.

Have any of you been playing Esper Miracles lately? I've played it on and off, and I think it's good, but it's got a lot of clunk with Jace, Teferi, Terinus, Charm, DSphere, and even Snapcaster as 3+ mana cards. Any tips for alleviating that? Should The deck be playing 3 Charms? Fewer Teferis?

Its been a couple months, so I haven't tried with any of the new walkers (not sure I want any main)
but it wasn't horribly clunky. You have 6ish removal spells at 1 cmc, snares, negates, knots at 1-2, 4 opts plus maybe spellbombs.

4 charms, 2ish snaps, 4ish walkers, 3ish cryptics, option d sphere isn't too stressful compared to UW. If anything, charm is more likely to get you to your 4/5 drops than a narset or baby tef would be.

Some of the clunkiness is also balanced out by wrathing them on turn 2 or 3 as well.

So, I’ve got a 4-0 today. Paired against Izzet Phoenix (2-0), UB Turns (2-0), AltarVine (2-1) and Humans (2-1).

In three tournaments, I’ve got 4-1, 2-2, 4-0 changing little. Force of Negation immediately impacted the deck, cause it’s basically a mono blue that splashes two colors. Turn 0 protection is exactly what the deck was lacking, and it showed today against both AltarVine and Humans in game one (Looting, Vial). It’s also the perfect way to deal with opposing walkers in counterwars (Cryptic and Charm suddenly become WAY more appealing even in the mirror).

Swapped a Torrential Gearhulk for a Hero’s Downfall, cause Narset and little a Teferi needs to be solved. Same reasoning for the Detention Sphere in the sideboard.

Lately I’ve been immersed in testing with UR/Grixis Bloo and Phoenix variants, but I feel that it’s a good time to play this deck.

How well does your deck handle Humans?

Pretty good, especially after sideboard. We also often trade creature for creature, and sac effects are strong vs the new add. The only issues I had until now were against Blood Moon heavy decks and Mono Red Phoenix.

I am currently giving Kaya, Orzhov Usurper a bigger focus, especially in combination with the new Kaya's Guile (both PW and Guile are 2-ofs in my current list). She is naturally good in my local meta and she gives you another angle of attack. In more cases than I expected, her -5 is deadly, now greatly supported by the Guile's exile GY mode. I think she is pretty underrated atm.