Lol I've been testing esper shoal go , and while it is actually REALLY nice to exile spell snare and shoal a turn one goblin guide or something, that deck wants to play like 24 lands and no revs.
Rev is still WAY too good at pulling us out of situations we should have otherwise lost
How viable is two colour control over three? I've been most interested in straight UW as of late; conserving life against aggro is very relevant in my local meta, and such would also help against T1 Blood Moon.
How viable is two colour control over three? I've been most interested in straight UW as of late; conserving life against aggro is very relevant in my local meta, and such would also help against T1 Blood Moon.
Esper charm is too good. That's really all there is to say about this style. If you wanted to play Tapout then I can see it. But as t stands, no
@stokpile: Could you please share your experience about your UW Draw go list? How does the serum vision plan plays out for you? Was cutting 2 lands, cryptic and TT a problem / was it worth to get more filtering? How does your recent list look like?
So far the only time I had mana trouble was when my hand had 2 serums and 2 plains. With the current mana base hands like that are especially uncommon and are not worthwhile to worry about. As for land count in particular, cutting 2 lands 1 TT and 1 cryptic hasn't been a problem since the serums do dig fairly deep so I'm never short on lands. In addition to that, having to sometimes "cast" my land drop also isn't a problem with snares and paths covering my extra land drops and not having wasted mana. I've also cut the red splash because after many, many more matches against tron (eldrazi, RG, and UW gifts variants) I have yet to drop a game to them even when they have the nut perfects. With so many answers I regularly answer 100% of the threats in their entire deck so the crumbles are just overkill, so a single bribery and the other flexible variants are more than enough.
So far I like the filtering and selection from serum, but I do feel the need for another think twice or a cryptic. Just one more solid 2 for 1 that isn't snapcaster mage, just something to put more cards in my hand. I'm considering cutting down to 3 serums and going up to 4 TT, but would make my land draws a bit more awkward. But so far the mana base has remained pristine and I've never had the situation come up where needing untapped blue on turn 1 is a problem. Even if I can't AV on 1 because I'm on plains and colonnades, I don't mind waiting until turn 3 to hold up snares. The deck is built to last 20+ turns so it's not a real problem.
Speaking of the SB, the cop red is just a personal thing since there is such a retarded amount of burn locally and I just hate losing to the deck so I have one ruthless nut crushing hate card just for them. I still wish I could work the baneslayers into the main because I bring them in almost every match where they're phenomenal. They're just... damn son. The 5th wrath effect is there because the format seems to be getting more creature heavy and I'm sick of losing to fish or aggro zoo because I didn't find a wrath after 3 draw spells >_<
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And on that day, Garfield said unto the world "Go ye forth and durdle!"
Of late my open slots have been a third RIP and two timely reinforcements, but that's a response to ZERO affinity and tons of grixis and living end where I now live, so at a larger event those three slots would all be stony silence because I do my part against the affinity menace.
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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
Of late my open slots have been a third RIP and two timely reinforcements, but that's a response to ZERO affinity and tons of grixis and living end where I now live, so at a larger event those three slots would all be stony silence because I do my part against the affinity menace.
@amalek
I must admit that, though I respect you, you very much confuse me. How can you not play Runed Halo mainboard? How do you not flood out on Snares all of the time? How do you even play SoD (a card I can never seem to get behind)? You're a genius, so I know that you know how to build a deck -- but there's no chance I could win with that list lol.
In other news, I'm almost certain I want to play a 4th wrath and trim a Cryptic -- maybe even playing Shoal for better early game (I haven't tested it yet, honestly).
Of late my open slots have been a third RIP and two timely reinforcements, but that's a response to ZERO affinity and tons of grixis and living end where I now live, so at a larger event those three slots would all be stony silence because I do my part against the affinity menace.
The only thing that confuses me is that there's no way to beat Tron with this list. I don't think the Stony Silences would help either. I can respect ignoring the matchup though, but I think cards that are good against it (Thoughtseize and Clique) are also good cards against other decks, so why not include them in the 75?
Well, I'll put this out here, even though I'm not amalek:
Every time I've played runed halo mainboard, I've been incredibly disappointed. Its a fine sideboard card, but I hate seeing it mainboard half the time.
Spell snare is an amazing card, and every time I've played a list without the full set (be it jeskai, u/w, whatever) I've been disappointed. I want to see one in my opening hand 100% of games, or very nearly. Its just an incredibly strong card that does a lot of what we need.
Shadow of doubt, a lot has been posted about, (especially by me) and I don't feel like repeating myself, but a lot of people give this card a lot less credit than it deserves.
On the other hand: a fourth mainboard wrath still seems pretty appealing to me, depending on the meta I expect. Its another one of those cards that I'd love to see turn 4 every game, though narrow enough that I'm still flip-flopping on the 4th copy main/side.
I do agree that clique just seems like a core sideboard card to me. Its honestly just so incredibly relevant against a lot of matchups that we either struggle with, or just matches up nicely with problem cards.
Why haven't I ever thought of Oblivion Stone as a great catch all card that wraths the board and gets by Blood Moon?! It's slow, but I'm excited to try it, and boy do I agree with Annihilator that it would be damn sexy to recur it with Academy Ruins. I was really excited about using Perilous Vault/O-Stone vs Tron, but then I remembered all of their on cast permanent exile effects. Everything is always too good to be true in Magic, but I think it's still worth testing the "super EE plan" as SES says.
Edit: Wow am I dumb. O-Stone is garbage vs Tron, as their walkers can also get rid of it, and I knew that lol.
I agree with everything Cody-X recently said except for Vendilion Clique being a mandatory sideboard card. I very well may go back to it, but I have not missed it as much as I thought I would since cutting it.
NOOOOO JJKMAN
Unrelated - I'm moving up to Madison WI soon. Anyone in the MTG scene there? I've heard good things.
Further unrelated - I got my first foil Esper Charm after searching trade binders for over a year! go me.
Is Grixis worth worrying about? I feel like Leyline + our regular game plan shuts them down harder than any other deck. They don't have a way to remove it bar Cryptic Command bounce - which, if they initiate the war with a 4 mana spell, we will undoubtedly win.
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Magic player since July 2011.
Modern - Esper Draw-Go (Best finish - 12-3, 45th at GP Charlotte 2015), Jeskai Control, UR Breach Moon
I dont think grixis is worth worrying about.
The harder control versions are definitely worse for us, but I think we're favored against all of them.
Some lists play a ton of dispels, which can be annoying, but otherwise it shouldn't be too bad.
Generally being content to wait them out, until you can empty their hand/safely beat in with colonnade should do it.
Some people have recommended elspeth sun's champion against them, but I think thats very dependent on the list you're playing against.
Of late my open slots have been a third RIP and two timely reinforcements, but that's a response to ZERO affinity and tons of grixis and living end where I now live, so at a larger event those three slots would all be stony silence because I do my part against the affinity menace.
@amalek
I must admit that, though I respect you, you very much confuse me. How can you not play Runed Halo mainboard? How do you not flood out on Snares all of the time? How do you even play SoD (a card I can never seem to get behind)? You're a genius, so I know that you know how to build a deck -- but there's no chance I could win with that list lol.
In other news, I'm almost certain I want to play a 4th wrath and trim a Cryptic -- maybe even playing Shoal for better early game (I haven't tested it yet, honestly).
I played the above list today with a 3rd RIP, a grave titan, and a wurmcoil engine as the SB flex slots. Ended up 1-2: Lost to blue moon by winning game one, then getting stuck on 4 lands in both sideboard games from a starting hand with 3 lands, all of my colors, and either triple think twice or think twice/double esper charm. He didn't counter anything. I just bricked on all the card draw and ended up with 4 lands in play out of almost 30 cards twice in a row.
Round two, I beat 8-whack, including an epic game three in which I started on the draw, stabilized on turn five with verdict + path on ONE life, and managed to navigate six turns before I found a leyline, and then a few more turns before I found a white sun's to put the game away. Literally, the only way to describe that game is that I had the most accurate read on this guys soul I've ever had on anyone, and picking exactly what threat to play around every turn with 100% accuracy, which only worked because he was stuck on lands (figures, mr. 16 mountain deck).
Round 3, I lost to an esper tezzerator list--this just isn't a matchup we can really effectively beat the way we're currently configured. They have bridge to lock out most of our win cons, they can go wide with thopters, and they have a discard and countermagic package in the mainboard that just makes it hard to win game one. Game 2/3 I think they're just better positioned post board.
I would have had a much easier time with better pairings, easily 40% of the room was on the grixis hard control deck (metagame getting so inbred that sideboarding boseiju for crumble to dust to beat cavern of souls is literally a thing in the metagame), and there were a few Jeskai nahiri decks/random midrange brews/decks. I just hit the ONE tezzerator player, the ONE blue moon player (which isn't a terrible matchup, I just got really unlucky), and the ONE 8-whack player.
My reasoning for not playing runed halo mainboard is that I don't want opponents sideboarding for it--most decks I bring it in against don't care about leyline or don't play hate that can kill leyline in their 75, so it avoids the enchantment hate when relevant. Furthermore, I'd rather have flexibility in my mainboard than narrow answers, and runed halo is a pretty narrow answer--it's only good against repeatable threats, generally manlands most of the time (in game 1's). In a metagame where I want them mainboard, I've determined I'll just play my grixis death's shadow suicide list instead of trying to mainboard runed halos.
Shadow of Doubt is a swiss army knife and I think maximizing its usage in a given game is probably one of the more critical skills with the deck. Today, for example, in game one of the blue moon matchup, I engineered a chance to double strip mine my opponent, snipe a fetch, and get a free path to exile in a single turn. How? Double shadow of Doubt in my opening hand and good timing to maximize their usage in a single turn. I declined to snipe his turn two fetch on the draw with one of those shadows, because I determined that the most important thing in the matchup was getting a large amount of value from it. I have literally never lost a game with shadow of doubt in my hand--I'm either winning and it cycles, similarly to a think twice in matchups where I bring in rest in peace (Yes, I keep them in together 99% of the time, and no, it's not a nonbo!), and if it isn't cycling, it's doing something relevant, which ends up being a 2 for 1 almost every time, if not better.
What most people think of when they see shadow of doubt is that it's a 5/10 card in pretty much every matchup, except scapeshift pretty much. Therefore, they deem it weak. What they forget is that it's a 5/10 card in EVERY matchup game one--MAYBE it's bad against affinity, but even then it cycles for 2 mana, unlike sphinx's revelation or esper charm. And it's equally good against ad nauseum, burn, collected company/chord decks, and infect. It's a 5/10 card everywhere, whereas path to exile or supreme verdict alternate between 10's and 0's. Consistency is key in decks like ours that are prone to having "wrong-half-of-deck-itis"
One of these days, I'll make it to a GP as a player instead of a judge, and do my best to get us on stream again.
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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'm surprised you have an issue with tezzerator.
They should be more or less unable to resolve much important things barring an insane draw, and really bridge shouldn't bother us, since we can bounce it before we hit them for lethal, and we can potentially mill them out. I don't think its an amazing matchup for us (especially compared to jeskai) but its passable.
(Think twice and rip are a nonbo. It might not break the deck, but they still pull in different directions)
I personally am not a fan of SoD against burn, though I probably have to sideboard more cards out than you do, since you've got leylines or such main.
I may have mentioned this earlier, but I'm officially off ancestral visions in esper for the time being. The card does not belong here. Its powerful at best, but its proven too finicky for me to want to deal with any longer. At this point, I think it belongs in jeskai lists that don't play nahiri, bug, or esper midrange (and nowhere else.) Considering 2/3 of that list aren't real decks, well, extrapolate.
Leyline is not my favorite mainboard card, but its playable in some regard.
Negate, like halo, is something I've played main, and I tend to be disappointed.
I've lost more games to fulminator mage on curve than any other card in modern, by a good margin.
Negate makes this even worse, but past fulminator mage, there are an awful lot of cards it misses. I'd rather play rune snags if I wanted 4 mainboard 2 cmc counters.
Instead of 3 clique and 4 teferi I just went all in on clique and boy was I happy. Obviously they're legendary but I will railroad one clique right into another just for the trigger. I couldnt care less.
3 baneslayers were solid, ran into black red goblins in round one so that felt justified. (2-1)
Other matchups were 2-1 va naya allies, 2-0 vs Jund, and 2-0 vs a red green deck that uses collected company eot to get ball lightning and groundbreaker and also turn 2 woolly thoctar
The deck was actually sweet but I path snap pathed my way to victory basically
You should play 4Ancestral Vision, it's a must have in esper control.
Don't play leyline, even in the 75cards.
Shadow of doubt isn't that good right now, and play 2 or 3negate main, it's really good.
I can't really agree with most any this. Other than the Negates (3 is too many tho), I don't think you've got it right. AV is not for this deck, as we already have the powerful draw spells we need (TT, Charm, and Rev). The only cards that would make any impact are basically reprints of the aforementioned cards at lower mana costs or with other upsides.
Leyline is one of the best cards to have against most combo in general, as well as UR control/aggro decks -- sure, they're gonna prepare something for it, but that only proves that it's a good threat to their strategy. Sometimes they won't be able to find/resolve whatever they have to deal w/ the Leyline. Leyline also has application in the BGx matchup specifically and other odd places (tho most of the other odd cases, like against Gifts decks, are much better covered by Runed Halo tbh).
About SoD -- I hate the card, and it's never done anything for me in the multiple times I've played it in this deck. That said, some people have good reasons for playing it, and what it does is useful (a Sinkhole that draws a card, and at instant speed, what's not to like? xD). It just never makes it in my Esper lists because I'm simply not interested in any LD, despite that it sometimes counters spells like Chord and Scapeshift (neither of which ever show up in my meta). Yes, it always does something, but if the thing it always does is usually underwhelming, I'm not playing it.
@Cody
I'mma test a list with Snags and see if I like it -- you may be onto something there. I never play with RiP anyways.
I'm brewing u/w Shoal-go.
If anybody here gets a half-chub going on whenever they think of casting Whispers of the muse in modern, then stay tuned.
Wouldn't Planar Cleansing or Merciless Eviction be more efficient? That or at least Oblivion Stone.
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.
Once I land a perilous vault it stalls the board up. Gives me time to get more counters/win con going
Rev is still WAY too good at pulling us out of situations we should have otherwise lost
Esper charm is too good. That's really all there is to say about this style. If you wanted to play Tapout then I can see it. But as t stands, no
Here's the UW list I'm currently piloting:
1 Snapcaster Mage
//Enchantment (2)
2 Runed Halo
//Instant (20)
3 Cryptic Command
2 Logic Knot
2 Negate
4 Path to Exile
3 Spell Snare
2 Sphinx's Revelation
3 Think Twice
1 White Sun's Zenith
//Planeswalker (1)
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Serum Visions
4 Supreme Verdict
//Land (24)
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Flooded Strand
2 Ghost Quarter
2 Hallowed Fountain
5 Island
1 Mystic Gate
2 Plains
2 Polluted Delta
2 Prairie Stream
1 Bribery
1 Circle of Protection: Red
1 Condemn
1 Detention Sphere
2 Rest in Peace
2 Dispel
1 Pithing Needle
1 Runed Halo
2 Stony Silence
1 Wrath of God
So far the only time I had mana trouble was when my hand had 2 serums and 2 plains. With the current mana base hands like that are especially uncommon and are not worthwhile to worry about. As for land count in particular, cutting 2 lands 1 TT and 1 cryptic hasn't been a problem since the serums do dig fairly deep so I'm never short on lands. In addition to that, having to sometimes "cast" my land drop also isn't a problem with snares and paths covering my extra land drops and not having wasted mana. I've also cut the red splash because after many, many more matches against tron (eldrazi, RG, and UW gifts variants) I have yet to drop a game to them even when they have the nut perfects. With so many answers I regularly answer 100% of the threats in their entire deck so the crumbles are just overkill, so a single bribery and the other flexible variants are more than enough.
So far I like the filtering and selection from serum, but I do feel the need for another think twice or a cryptic. Just one more solid 2 for 1 that isn't snapcaster mage, just something to put more cards in my hand. I'm considering cutting down to 3 serums and going up to 4 TT, but would make my land draws a bit more awkward. But so far the mana base has remained pristine and I've never had the situation come up where needing untapped blue on turn 1 is a problem. Even if I can't AV on 1 because I'm on plains and colonnades, I don't mind waiting until turn 3 to hold up snares. The deck is built to last 20+ turns so it's not a real problem.
Speaking of the SB, the cop red is just a personal thing since there is such a retarded amount of burn locally and I just hate losing to the deck so I have one ruthless nut crushing hate card just for them. I still wish I could work the baneslayers into the main because I bring them in almost every match where they're phenomenal. They're just... damn son. The 5th wrath effect is there because the format seems to be getting more creature heavy and I'm sick of losing to fish or aggro zoo because I didn't find a wrath after 3 draw spells >_<
4 flooded strand
4 polluted delta
3 hallowed fountain
2 watery grave
3 island
2 plains
1 swamp
1 drowned catacomb
2 ghost quarter
4 cryptic command
4 spell snare
2 logic knot
4 esper charm
2 snapcaster mage
2 shadow of doubt
2 sphinx's revelation
4 path to exile
3 supreme verdict
2 leyline of sanctity
1 white sun's zenith
2 celestial purge
2 baneslayer angel
2 runed halo
2 Rest in Peace
1 wrath of god
1 Elspeth, sun's champion
1 negate
1 dispel
3 open slots
Of late my open slots have been a third RIP and two timely reinforcements, but that's a response to ZERO affinity and tons of grixis and living end where I now live, so at a larger event those three slots would all be stony silence because I do my part against the affinity menace.
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
@amalek
I must admit that, though I respect you, you very much confuse me. How can you not play Runed Halo mainboard? How do you not flood out on Snares all of the time? How do you even play SoD (a card I can never seem to get behind)? You're a genius, so I know that you know how to build a deck -- but there's no chance I could win with that list lol.
In other news, I'm almost certain I want to play a 4th wrath and trim a Cryptic -- maybe even playing Shoal for better early game (I haven't tested it yet, honestly).
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.
The only thing that confuses me is that there's no way to beat Tron with this list. I don't think the Stony Silences would help either. I can respect ignoring the matchup though, but I think cards that are good against it (Thoughtseize and Clique) are also good cards against other decks, so why not include them in the 75?
Every time I've played runed halo mainboard, I've been incredibly disappointed. Its a fine sideboard card, but I hate seeing it mainboard half the time.
Spell snare is an amazing card, and every time I've played a list without the full set (be it jeskai, u/w, whatever) I've been disappointed. I want to see one in my opening hand 100% of games, or very nearly. Its just an incredibly strong card that does a lot of what we need.
Shadow of doubt, a lot has been posted about, (especially by me) and I don't feel like repeating myself, but a lot of people give this card a lot less credit than it deserves.
On the other hand: a fourth mainboard wrath still seems pretty appealing to me, depending on the meta I expect. Its another one of those cards that I'd love to see turn 4 every game, though narrow enough that I'm still flip-flopping on the 4th copy main/side.
I do agree that clique just seems like a core sideboard card to me. Its honestly just so incredibly relevant against a lot of matchups that we either struggle with, or just matches up nicely with problem cards.
Why haven't I ever thought of Oblivion Stone as a great catch all card that wraths the board and gets by Blood Moon?! It's slow, but I'm excited to try it, and boy do I agree with Annihilator that it would be damn sexy to recur it with Academy Ruins. I was really excited about using Perilous Vault/O-Stone vs Tron, but then I remembered all of their on cast permanent exile effects. Everything is always too good to be true in Magic, but I think it's still worth testing the "super EE plan" as SES says.
Edit: Wow am I dumb. O-Stone is garbage vs Tron, as their walkers can also get rid of it, and I knew that lol.
NOOOOO JJKMAN
Unrelated - I'm moving up to Madison WI soon. Anyone in the MTG scene there? I've heard good things.
Further unrelated - I got my first foil Esper Charm after searching trade binders for over a year! go me.
Is Grixis worth worrying about? I feel like Leyline + our regular game plan shuts them down harder than any other deck. They don't have a way to remove it bar Cryptic Command bounce - which, if they initiate the war with a 4 mana spell, we will undoubtedly win.
Modern - Esper Draw-Go (Best finish - 12-3, 45th at GP Charlotte 2015), Jeskai Control, UR Breach Moon
The harder control versions are definitely worse for us, but I think we're favored against all of them.
Some lists play a ton of dispels, which can be annoying, but otherwise it shouldn't be too bad.
Generally being content to wait them out, until you can empty their hand/safely beat in with colonnade should do it.
Some people have recommended elspeth sun's champion against them, but I think thats very dependent on the list you're playing against.
I played the above list today with a 3rd RIP, a grave titan, and a wurmcoil engine as the SB flex slots. Ended up 1-2: Lost to blue moon by winning game one, then getting stuck on 4 lands in both sideboard games from a starting hand with 3 lands, all of my colors, and either triple think twice or think twice/double esper charm. He didn't counter anything. I just bricked on all the card draw and ended up with 4 lands in play out of almost 30 cards twice in a row.
Round two, I beat 8-whack, including an epic game three in which I started on the draw, stabilized on turn five with verdict + path on ONE life, and managed to navigate six turns before I found a leyline, and then a few more turns before I found a white sun's to put the game away. Literally, the only way to describe that game is that I had the most accurate read on this guys soul I've ever had on anyone, and picking exactly what threat to play around every turn with 100% accuracy, which only worked because he was stuck on lands (figures, mr. 16 mountain deck).
Round 3, I lost to an esper tezzerator list--this just isn't a matchup we can really effectively beat the way we're currently configured. They have bridge to lock out most of our win cons, they can go wide with thopters, and they have a discard and countermagic package in the mainboard that just makes it hard to win game one. Game 2/3 I think they're just better positioned post board.
I would have had a much easier time with better pairings, easily 40% of the room was on the grixis hard control deck (metagame getting so inbred that sideboarding boseiju for crumble to dust to beat cavern of souls is literally a thing in the metagame), and there were a few Jeskai nahiri decks/random midrange brews/decks. I just hit the ONE tezzerator player, the ONE blue moon player (which isn't a terrible matchup, I just got really unlucky), and the ONE 8-whack player.
My reasoning for not playing runed halo mainboard is that I don't want opponents sideboarding for it--most decks I bring it in against don't care about leyline or don't play hate that can kill leyline in their 75, so it avoids the enchantment hate when relevant. Furthermore, I'd rather have flexibility in my mainboard than narrow answers, and runed halo is a pretty narrow answer--it's only good against repeatable threats, generally manlands most of the time (in game 1's). In a metagame where I want them mainboard, I've determined I'll just play my grixis death's shadow suicide list instead of trying to mainboard runed halos.
Shadow of Doubt is a swiss army knife and I think maximizing its usage in a given game is probably one of the more critical skills with the deck. Today, for example, in game one of the blue moon matchup, I engineered a chance to double strip mine my opponent, snipe a fetch, and get a free path to exile in a single turn. How? Double shadow of Doubt in my opening hand and good timing to maximize their usage in a single turn. I declined to snipe his turn two fetch on the draw with one of those shadows, because I determined that the most important thing in the matchup was getting a large amount of value from it. I have literally never lost a game with shadow of doubt in my hand--I'm either winning and it cycles, similarly to a think twice in matchups where I bring in rest in peace (Yes, I keep them in together 99% of the time, and no, it's not a nonbo!), and if it isn't cycling, it's doing something relevant, which ends up being a 2 for 1 almost every time, if not better.
What most people think of when they see shadow of doubt is that it's a 5/10 card in pretty much every matchup, except scapeshift pretty much. Therefore, they deem it weak. What they forget is that it's a 5/10 card in EVERY matchup game one--MAYBE it's bad against affinity, but even then it cycles for 2 mana, unlike sphinx's revelation or esper charm. And it's equally good against ad nauseum, burn, collected company/chord decks, and infect. It's a 5/10 card everywhere, whereas path to exile or supreme verdict alternate between 10's and 0's. Consistency is key in decks like ours that are prone to having "wrong-half-of-deck-itis"
One of these days, I'll make it to a GP as a player instead of a judge, and do my best to get us on stream again.
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
They should be more or less unable to resolve much important things barring an insane draw, and really bridge shouldn't bother us, since we can bounce it before we hit them for lethal, and we can potentially mill them out. I don't think its an amazing matchup for us (especially compared to jeskai) but its passable.
(Think twice and rip are a nonbo. It might not break the deck, but they still pull in different directions)
I personally am not a fan of SoD against burn, though I probably have to sideboard more cards out than you do, since you've got leylines or such main.
I may have mentioned this earlier, but I'm officially off ancestral visions in esper for the time being. The card does not belong here. Its powerful at best, but its proven too finicky for me to want to deal with any longer. At this point, I think it belongs in jeskai lists that don't play nahiri, bug, or esper midrange (and nowhere else.) Considering 2/3 of that list aren't real decks, well, extrapolate.
Leyline is not my favorite mainboard card, but its playable in some regard.
Negate, like halo, is something I've played main, and I tend to be disappointed.
I've lost more games to fulminator mage on curve than any other card in modern, by a good margin.
Negate makes this even worse, but past fulminator mage, there are an awful lot of cards it misses. I'd rather play rune snags if I wanted 4 mainboard 2 cmc counters.
Sideboard as follows
3x baneslayer Angel
2x stony silence
1x pithing needle
2x runed halo
2x detention sphere
1x supreme verdict
Instead of 3 clique and 4 teferi I just went all in on clique and boy was I happy. Obviously they're legendary but I will railroad one clique right into another just for the trigger. I couldnt care less.
3 baneslayers were solid, ran into black red goblins in round one so that felt justified. (2-1)
Other matchups were 2-1 va naya allies, 2-0 vs Jund, and 2-0 vs a red green deck that uses collected company eot to get ball lightning and groundbreaker and also turn 2 woolly thoctar
The deck was actually sweet but I path snap pathed my way to victory basically
I can't really agree with most any this. Other than the Negates (3 is too many tho), I don't think you've got it right. AV is not for this deck, as we already have the powerful draw spells we need (TT, Charm, and Rev). The only cards that would make any impact are basically reprints of the aforementioned cards at lower mana costs or with other upsides.
Leyline is one of the best cards to have against most combo in general, as well as UR control/aggro decks -- sure, they're gonna prepare something for it, but that only proves that it's a good threat to their strategy. Sometimes they won't be able to find/resolve whatever they have to deal w/ the Leyline. Leyline also has application in the BGx matchup specifically and other odd places (tho most of the other odd cases, like against Gifts decks, are much better covered by Runed Halo tbh).
About SoD -- I hate the card, and it's never done anything for me in the multiple times I've played it in this deck. That said, some people have good reasons for playing it, and what it does is useful (a Sinkhole that draws a card, and at instant speed, what's not to like? xD). It just never makes it in my Esper lists because I'm simply not interested in any LD, despite that it sometimes counters spells like Chord and Scapeshift (neither of which ever show up in my meta). Yes, it always does something, but if the thing it always does is usually underwhelming, I'm not playing it.
@Cody
I'mma test a list with Snags and see if I like it -- you may be onto something there. I never play with RiP anyways.
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.