EDIT: Whoever isn't playing 2 Engineered Exp, is probably incorrect
I was regrettably waiting until December to get mine due to the dip in prices. Got burned on that one! What's the best budget option? Ratchet Bomb? Drown in Sorrow? Or, sorry, don't bother. There is no budget replacement worth playing?
Im here. Wafo is a HoF member so he gets 3 byes which means he went 6-5.
Manabase on his list makes sense only if your gameplan is tap land turn 1, tap land and SV or path on two.
However, 3 byes means his odd decklist makes more sense. Traditionally, modo mirrors paper but the top 2 or 3 linear decks lose half their combined share to midrange decks. In the winner's bracket this weekend, that clearly wasn't the case with all the linear aggro floating around the top tables.
As far as EE goes, I don't run them, but I play 2 BA mainboard, which covers most of the same matchups.
This afternoon I played a local 3 rounder and went 0-2-1. Drew round one against black/white eldrazi taxes. Won game one, game two he won in turns. I just drew super poorly, elspeth and a baneslayer held him off solo forlike 8 turns, i just couldn't draw out of his blinking tks over and over. Round 2 i lose in thre to naya chord. He has a double or triple voice of resurgence opening hand all three games. Round 3 i lose to mono green stompy having one last threat to my bricks both games, never got to turn the corner.
Blessed alliance was super good in all three matches. Legit considering dropping leylines for BA 3 and verdict 4. Felt over the last few events like I was always looking for a board wipe and every time I lost a winnable game it was because of failing to find a board wipe.
Final thought: if you are willing to scoop to a resolved blood moon any time you don't have charm or purge in hand, there is the option of shocks/check lands/ colonnade/2 basics/ some ghost quarters/some reflecting pools as a nearly painless stable 3 color manabase.
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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 starting to think that this thread combined might be more experienced with Esper than Wafo is right now, lol. I mean, it's only 10+ people with over 2 years worth of combined experience that he doesn't have haha, so it makes sense.
Like, I honestly have more respect for every regular on this thread than I do for Wafo right now. It's... wierd. I thought Wafo was senpai?
Oh, come on now. WTF. Make 8 5-0 is comp league on modo in a month before saying nonsense, otherwise it's best to pay attention and try to understand the way wafo-tapa deck was built instead of dismissing whatever didn't fit your previous knowledge. You're not learning anything this way.
I'm not dismissing anything. I tested Serum, didn't like it after multiple matches. I tested Leak, hated it. I tested Secure and switched over to it. I tested AV and didn't love it. I was saying that it was cool to see him tuning his lists, and they looked more and more streamlined as he kept 5-0ing. Today it looks like a complete 180 degree turn in the wrong direction, and there's nothing at all wrong with calling that out.
Also, just because I have more respect for the peeps on this forum doesn't mean I don't respect Wafo. I do, he's obvioulsy a great player. But a great player can do well in a tourney with a very inconsistent pile -- great players playing great cards will do great, regardless of deck tuning. But I know amalek and SES and everyone else here way better than I know Wafo, and it's no coincidence that more than a couple of us are shocked by the newest list.
Again I will chime in here and just agree. As a certified wafo fan boy, I was pretty surprised at the list, in a "welllll I guess " kind of way.
To anyone vehemently defying any wafo criticism, Don't fall into the trap of "well you aren't a hall of famer" bc think about it, if you (heaven forbid) got some rare illness, would you be all "I don't want any doctor to treat me unless they've also had the same illness"? Of course not. You would listen to whoever knew what they're talking about.
I'm obviously not saying wafo doesn't know what he's talking about, but I AM saying in this case maybe he got a little too ambitious / too cute for his own good. And most players who post and lurk here have won enough games (and gotten reamed in the ass for making bad calls) enough times to look at the list and say "hey that's not quite right"
You don't have to take my word for it. He went 6-5 in an open field. He did 8 5-0's , but how many days did he fail to place? People assume he was 40-0 in comp leagues, but for all anyone here knows, he was 40-100. You only see his deck lists from the days he actually x-0'd and that's the subtle flaw in putting those lists on a pedestal.
Hopefully he'll write another love letter to p Chapin for us to pour over. I'll be interested to read his thought process if anything Maybe the deck was fire and he just mulled to 3 every game. Who knows ?
Still playing a Mana Leak? An AV Main? Using a singleton Secure rather than just putting in Zenith?
Why do you assume Secure is only better than Zenith if you run 2 copies? Should he switch back to Zenith so that he can "loop it against Junk Company and beat the combo"?
SIX buddy lands (Glacial and Catacomb)? Only 3 fetchable duals?
Wafo originally ran a Godless Shrine. That made no sense and people eventually cut it. Why the hell are we running a second Watery Grave, though? You seriously think it's better than a Drowned Catacomb? If he found that he didn't need the fourth Colonnade (the biggest menace to the manabase by far), is adding a third Glacial Fotress so bad? I only run 4 M10 duals and 4 Colonnade, but the psychology is sound enough. And have you played Serum Vision in this deck, yet? If you're fetching a basic island turn 1 the majority of games, a M10 dual is better than a shockland the following turn. You don't lead with a shockland and fetch basics on turn 2 and/or 3 like you normally would.
Still playing Souls in the board? Why is he playing 3 Snaps again? I don't see Condemn or Blessed Alliance in the main,
Blessed Alliance is a really bad version of Lightning Helix. Really bad. It's literally only Modern playable if you're worried about Hexproof creatures or "gain 4" is worth a card. In other words, it can make the sideboard against Burn and Infect.
Dang. I mean, this deck is just very, very different than the lists most of us have settled on -- different meaning worse, IMO.
Don't get me wrong, I respect Wafo-Tapa. But I definitely reserve the right to critique his lists -- and dislike/disagree with them.
Edit: I really wish Wafo was on this thread, for a number of reasons -- maybe we could help him test things out and find THE list, ya'know? There are a lot of good minds here.
Test on Cockatrice? I used to do that kind of thing back when I first got back into the game and it's even lamer than playing in "Tournament Practice" on MODO.
In all fairness, between Amalek's adherence to the deck's tradition and SES' brews, we're in good hands. SES will pull people to test new things and they will return to Amalek's lists if the brew is worse than the original.
Yes. And good luck at your next 3-round FNM. Wafo has single-handedly put up more ***PUBLISHED*** wins with the deck in a single month than everyone else put together. You do realize that he only had 2 more wins in the GP where he originally played the deck int he first place? If this was the first time this deck had been published, all of this would be starting from scratch, with nobody complaining about the remix being worse than the original.
Oh, come on now. WTF. Make 8 5-0 is comp league on modo in a month before saying nonsense, otherwise it's best to pay attention and try to understand the way wafo-tapa deck was built instead of dismissing whatever didn't fit your previous knowledge. You're not learning anything this way.
Thank you. Let's consider for a second why Wafo thought his original list was garbage in the first place. He clearly started by running the same-old list back-to-back in Dailies and decided to revamp it because he wasn't winning enough. He settles on something and lands a pile of 5-0's and people seriously think it's not stronger than the original? They still want a playset of Spell Snares?
Y'all are killing me. If Amalek throws Leylines in his maindeck and goes 0-2-2 at an FNM you analyze and test his choices but when the progenitor of the entire archetype fails to cash a GP his deck is hot garbage? I seriously had an out-of-body experience reading these last 2 pages. I just can't believe it. What y'all are considering sacred cows are what Wafo put together to play at a single GP in Worcester back in 2014. The two dominant decks have been banned out of existence, and you're seriously talking about how his original deck is the right choice.
I personally don't trust anything said on the internet, and as far as I'm concerned any non-published results don't count for anything. If people choose to foil out their paper decks to play in local 4-round events instead of investing into the most competitive way to play Magic (MODO), where most pros go to test their decks, they shouldn't go hard on the actual reliable sources of data that people have on how to play this game. Considering this thread has produced 2 cases of confirmed high-level finishes in 2 years, it should take a solid couple of months worth of testing Wafo's changes before the assumption that his new list isn't plain better than the original, is confirmed.
Just wanna put out a pair of simple and easy to understand metaphors for everyone in here.
I don't need to be a certified M.D. to let you know that bleeding from your ears is a very bad thing.
I don't need 15 years of experience as a mechanic to tell you that smoke coming out of your car's engine is kinda dangerous.
Just sayin....
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And on that day, Garfield said unto the world "Go ye forth and durdle!"
Spell snare is certainly at a low point in utility. I continue with a full set because my meta in particular is weak to it; i pointed out two weeks ago that for the GP I would have run 2 or 3 and I probably am the biggest champion of the card ever.
Singleton AV is sort of fine; i get the feeling he had one flex slot tuat he wasn't sure on and put in a copy of the most efficient card draw spell in the format, true to his own style. The same justification works for mana leak: you can win with ONE dead card. Of negate/leak/AV, two will aleways be live draws regardless of the matchup.
Buddy lands are OK, but you can't run too many of them and still have a functioning mana base or you start to get clunky hands of three CIPT lands too often. Really, my issues with the wafo list from this event stem from two things: a manabase that I can only think was audibled at the last minute to shore up the aggressive matchups without a lot of thought, and a mainboard that took a big departure from his SUCCESSFUL modo runs. That oint bothers me the most; he had a thing going and he changed it up a good bit in ways that clearly look less focused or planned than any of his published 5-0 lists.
As far as blessed alliance goes... you clearly haven't tested with it. It's excellent in so many ways... edicts that only hit attackers are very strong right now with the number of decks going big on a single attacker, and in attritiony matxhups it answers hard to kill threats and pads your life against chip shot damage.
As far as published results... players have crushed moderate 5 and 6 round events a good bit over the last year and a half, many of us are I'm sure like me, we refuse to buy into mtgo just because the product sucks, and at least personally, I judge more events >3 rounds than I play in by at least a factor of five, if not more. I test with a competitive group of grinders and my lists perform reasonably. also, as you should well know, winning or loosing a matchup says little about how it's positioned. What matters far more is the dynamic of the matchuP--like Identified today, finding boardwipes appears to be the relevant takeaway point for my list for the last two weeks, which leads to the action point of adding another and testing again. I may not make huge sweeping chamges regularly like others, but I don't stay on a list for very long. I just make very small changes week to week and test them thoroughly. After two years, my mana base only changes at all if I want a third ghost quarter, sideboard/mainboard cards with BB costs early, or a singleton cavern. I can justify evert aspect of my stock manabase, including the exact split on basics, why I run two watery graves, why I have a drowned catacomb instead of a filter land or glacial fortress, why I play 4 colonnades, etc. There's a reason it doesn't change: it is pretty much optimized for any configuration of spells within the range of what I would feel comfortable sleeving up.
And, FWIW, I think his GP list is unequivocally worse than the original even in the metagame of today. I would NOT say that about some of his 5-0 published lists from MTGO.
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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
On mobile il respond more indepth later. I personally feel that when the deck is at the point to casting turn 4 verdict or 'better' (aka multi cryptic) I dont care about any of those cards.
Okay well not true but look at it like this:
Spell snare can stop all of those things. But its not like those things arnt counterable with logic knot. Its a versatility trade. Yes spell snare hits lots of stuff. But it doesn't feel good when you face off against a 1drop heavy deck. Heck or even ad-naus. I favor logic knot because unless i didnt fetch or cast visions turn 1. I can answer anything.
Is 8 2 for 1spells not including 1-2sphinxes necissary vs discard? No hand realistically beats jund Inquisition - thoughtseize turn1,2 liliana 3. Turn 4 goyf goyf. Is going down 1 thinktwice for serum going to end you? Probably not.
3 condemn sb seems justified when you side in snap. Its not like your going to push snap to side. Just trying to look at it from a different perspective. Sometimes you just gotta use snap as ambush viper.
I mean sure. Experience goes a long way. Just before this people were rocking the runed halo main. But now i dont see it as often. I think to suggest cards being outright wrong is too harsh
Ok wafo we were just kidding. Serum
Visions is #1. And we like your foils. You can use your real account now.
You had me up until the part where wafo invented draw go control. That's when we knew it was you, Guillame.
Somebody get amalek to update this the thread title guys. It's not just modern esper draw go. You WILL do as wafo says or you are NOT in the club.
*sassy finger wave*
Give me a break
I'm with amalek on "mtgo sucks I'm not spending money on that" , and it that makes my opinion invalid, oh well.
So now that we've all learned our opinions are completely irrelevant, and none of our experiences or testing matters (because we all only play 2 round fnm's against players who forgot to put spells in their deck and accidentally showed up with 75 lands) I guess we can all just go home.
It's not like Piotrowiak and Stokpile, pound for pound, put up better "in paper" results with similar lists than wafo did. Nah, screw those guys because they aren't on modo and haven't personally messaged Cipher a copy of their DC number and play history. /Sarcasm
I play in SCG events or grand prixs when I have time, I'm also a musician, Married, and work 60 hours a week doing R&D engineering for Apple. If I think mtgo sucks, and I'm not willing to just drop everything and leave my wife every weekend, but still manage to play 6-7 medium sized events per month, should that make my experiences totally irrelevant?
Where is your modo channel where you put up such amazing results? Who here has ever seen Cipher play a game of magic? I mean jesus christ dude. Nobody knows who you are and you don't even meet YOUR OWN CRITERIA for being allowed to have an opinion.
Donny is a busy guy but still finds time to crunch Caleb D ON STREAM (with a list he tweaked himself, even though he forgot to ask your permission)
That is the most off putting thing I've read in a while. What the hell is the point of even having a forum?
"Test on cockatrice? HA. I only test with a pool of former world champions. I used to do that lowly sort of thing back in the day before I wasn't just some guy *****ing about other people's opinions on the internet"
Of course this may or may not be true, because "I personally never trust anything I read on the internet" , so for all we know.....
I do think people are being too harsh on Wafo and each other in general here. I'm not gonna pretend like I'm a better player than Wafo. And it's weird to say, but I feel like the original 75 has gotten better over time. That could very well just be my experience and personal preference biasing me. I don't know.
@SES, I think Leyline is the best way to be burn. The only SB card I think is better against the deck is Kor Firewalker, which is dead against every other deck, while Grixis, BW Eldrazi, and several other t2/t3 decks (and a couple Jund players) hate Leyline. I did not play it the day of the GP, as I did not face any of those decks.
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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
Well this thread is becoming hostile, look I get it our hero has fallen in the biggest event of the year but we shall rise, between his lists from before and a hopefully continued run of modo events we will navigate this upcoming meta together, we all have various plans and ideas and pet cards and what not so ya all our lists are different but the core ideas and methodologies are sound and that's what matters we are all growing together like a disfunctional family but a family none the less.
I can't wait to start testing new ideas but still have love for some of the stuff I have tried and moved on from.
Jeeze. Read the tone of my reply to cipher. I don't attack the man; i respond to the perfectly valid points he makes.
Don't behave like middle schoolers/neanderthals/burn players. We're all better than that. We're supposed to be enlightened, cerebral players. Everyone is entitled to an opinion, everyone is welcome to share it, and nobody is going to get anything out of the thread if we don't behave civilly. I watch donnie's stream quite often, and I would say I disagree with many of the build and line of play decisions that he makes, but I understand why he makes them and respect the tradeoffs. My conservative tendancy caused me to take a draw yesterday where donnie's playstyle would likely have been able to pull out a win in three games. Equally, I feel less comfortable pushing for serum visions to find the right half of the deck, preferring to build as close to a 50/50 deck as I can and rely on experience and practice to carry me; others of you (cough SES cough) feel more comfortable taking bigger gambles on the metagame. I would say I probably have the most consistent performance of reported results with the deck, but I don't have the best results, not by a long shot. I 3-0 or 2-1 more frequently than could be necessarily expected, but I've only played three long events with the deck, to a combined 15-9 record. It's a decent record, but it's not super stellar. I test a lot, and my win percentage there mirrors that large event record-- a tad under 66% win rate. Very good in the grand scheme of things, but not enough events to expect a major (good) result.
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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
Thanks amalek, always nice to see positive vibes, it's true that a lot of the time I make different lines of play then most, and it's because I have as much add as I do patience and at times one is more present then the other, but it's also why I tend to not pick up unintentional draws as I'm a hyper fast player that enjoys slow durdle decks
I think I honestly wanna go back to the original iteration of the deck with a eye towards aggro as public enemy number 1. Wafo was right in ruling out tron and dredge as things to try and fight and burn even with a ton of hate cards can still power thru, I have accepted that we will never be able to beat every deck in the format it's just to wide open but I'm more then fine with a ton of 50/50 match ups and ones where the 60/40 is decided on play skill along with correct sb choices.
I'll be aiming to test both the resto heavy Ses build we are brewing as well as updates to original Wafo esper as I think both have merit. It's gonna be a great couple weeks of brews and think tank time.
Anybody have some insight on running fewer than 4 Snares? I have 2 in my list currently and haven't had the chance to test it. But it seems like a card that you either want 3-4 of or 0.
Honestly I think the sweet spot for snare in modern right now is 2 or 0 and you should run it only if you play 3 plus snapcasters. Affinity is no where near the numbers it has been on and jund although the most popular deck is already beat by draw and removal.
Edit: As for the Wafo list I agree with a lot of the overall concepts in it. It seemed like Wafo more stuff to dump into the yard for the extra logic knot snd a better curve which serum visions fills. The other reason for serum visions is the realization that the deck relies on seeing certain cards to even have a chance of winning such as verdict against heavy creature decks. In that case the added velocity is important to guarentee turn 4 board wipe without running more than 4 of them. In other words you see your best answers more often rather than having more answers. Less shocks also makes sense with actual turn 1 plays in the deck.
Negate and msnaleak flex spots and could be judt about snything else from what I can tell. yhe things I had problems with is his board. Wafo decided to ignore some matchups and just give up on them as he admitted himself. I believe his day 2 losses were due to running into linear decks that he chose to ignore suck as dredge, and burn. The sideboard just seemed to be aimed at zoo, infect, and merfolk.
Good tournament report. Against the first zooicide player, you misplayed badly. If he has nothing, you live and path eot to untap and snap path. don't use removal before damage if you can't answer EVERY attacker. Preferably, treat it like infect, only do things after damage or if the alternative is "lethal on the stack". For the second zooicide where you made a bad mull decision, you made two mistakes. First, you mulliganed a servicable hand in game one, and second, you put your opponent on a deck based on incomplete information before the match. Worth noting that I would keep any hand against UR storm with lands and spells because sideboarded games are so favorable, the only way you can lose the match is if you take a lot of mulligans in the match.
As far as tolaria west goes, just play a second explosives. Tormod's crypt sucks compared to relic and if you are in a match where ancestral is good, then spending 3 mana to go find it is probably bad.
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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
Ok wafo we were just kidding. Serum
Visions is #1. And we like your foils. You can use your real account now.
You had me up until the part where wafo invented draw go control. That's when we knew it was you, Guillame.
Somebody get amalek to update this the thread title guys. It's not just modern esper draw go. You WILL do as wafo says or you are NOT in the club.
*sassy finger wave*
Give me a break
I'm with amalek on "mtgo sucks I'm not spending money on that" , and it that makes my opinion invalid, oh well.
So now that we've all learned our opinions are completely irrelevant, and none of our experiences or testing matters (because we all only play 2 round fnm's against players who forgot to put spells in their deck and accidentally showed up with 75 lands) I guess we can all just go home.
It's not like Piotrowiak and Stokpile, pound for pound, put up better "in paper" results with similar lists than wafo did. Nah, screw those guys because they aren't on modo and haven't personally messaged Cipher a copy of their DC number and play history. /Sarcasm
I play in SCG events or grand prixs when I have time, I'm also a musician, Married, and work 60 hours a week doing R&D engineering for Apple. If I think mtgo sucks, and I'm not willing to just drop everything and leave my wife every weekend, but still manage to play 6-7 medium sized events per month, should that make my experiences totally irrelevant?
Where is your modo channel where you put up such amazing results? Who here has ever seen Cipher play a game of magic? I mean jesus christ dude. Nobody knows who you are and you don't even meet YOUR OWN CRITERIA for being allowed to have an opinion.
Donny is a busy guy but still finds time to crunch Caleb D ON STREAM (with a list he tweaked himself, even though he forgot to ask your permission)
That is the most off putting thing I've read in a while. What the hell is the point of even having a forum?
"Test on cockatrice? HA. I only test with a pool of former world champions. I used to do that lowly sort of thing back in the day before I wasn't just some guy *****ing about other people's opinions on the internet"
Of course this may or may not be true, because "I personally never trust anything I read on the internet" , so for all we know.....
I don't know what category of logical fallacy that post falls under, but obviously the whole forum is full of opinions, and nobody ever said opinions are only valid if someone is a hall of famer.
My point was that you guys collectively dumpstered his entire new decklist, called it garbage and used his failure to cash a GP as justification for hating on fundamentally different approach to the archetype. The irony is that analyzing what he decided was a better version of the deck is the most likely thing to result in a Tier 1 or Tier 1.5 deck. But no, people seem to be under the impression that this deck is already where it needs to be, because they read about someone's FNM and win-a-box results.
But it's really not. I used to play in local Modern and Legacy tournaments; I even top 4'd a Goyf tournament and a PPTQ with this deck. The same month I ran this online and never managed to 5-0 a league. The competition is stiffer than most any smaller (50 or less players) event you're going to find on paper. I take the deck to a GP and hit the same brick wall. I look on this forum and nobody has cracked it, either. I've been infinite in paper FNMs for as long as I can remember, with all of my deck updates coming from other people's prize money. I failed to Day 2 the last GP I was at. There's a glass ceiling above the local tournament level that you're just not seeing.
Then comes Wafo, who warps the maindeck and puts up more 5-0's in a 30-day period than most full-time MODO grinders. Sounds like a potentially Tier 1 deck to me. And...the entire thread rejects the final list completely off-hand.
That's the problem with forums: "...the opinion of the village idiot is given the same weight as the opinion of aristotle".
Edit: It would prolly be better to let this discussion go. =D
So, what tech out of the newest lists look most promising? I dont love Serum in the deck, but I will admit that just a little selection goes a long way here. Makes me want to play with Anticipate/Telling Time again.
@Cipher -- His final list didn't even do well... he went 6-5 with it, not counting his byes.
Byes are awarded for the first 3 rounds because those are the 3 easiest of the entire tournament. It's very unlikely he would have even taken a loss in the first 3 rounds, and comparing his run with the run of someone with no byes is essentially the same as adding 3 free wins to their record. The man went x-5 at a GP and finished outside the money. That's the relative measure that's used to compare GP results. You can't hack the numbers and apply them to your FNM results; even if the hack was legitimate the 11 rounds he played at the GP were at a much higher level. The 3 loses he took Day 2 were against other great pro/semi-pro players that also were on a run at the GP. These are the kind of grinders that would be at your FNM keeping you around till 2 a.m. so they could play it all out and take all the prize money
The changes between his GP list and the MODO lists is basically 2 additional Serum Visions. The cards he cut (26th land and second Secure the Wastes) in my mind make perfect sense and are changes I'd already made (never ran double Secure), or had been considering making for a long time (26th land in a deck so prone to flooding is overkill). He likely wasn't finished tweaking by the GP date, given the 1-of Ancestral, but I'm personally testing a full playset of Serum Visions with 25 land before checking out different options.
I hear him on "Think Twice being slow", but I think he made a fundamental mistake by slotting an Ancestral in it's place. I would never have considered trimming the card, but when you run an entire playset of Serum Visions, the deck's velocity changes and it makes sense to go down on Divination effects. I always thought you couldn't trim Think twice, but I also never considered you could make room for an entire set of Serum Visions and have the deck still function. I'm looking for a way to cut 2 Think Twice for testing, but with 8 removal spells and 10 counters, it's difficult to add anything without skewing the maindeck towards certain matchups, and the maindeck suffers against both the aggro and combo extremes of the metagame.
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I was regrettably waiting until December to get mine due to the dip in prices. Got burned on that one! What's the best budget option? Ratchet Bomb? Drown in Sorrow? Or, sorry, don't bother. There is no budget replacement worth playing?
Manabase on his list makes sense only if your gameplan is tap land turn 1, tap land and SV or path on two.
However, 3 byes means his odd decklist makes more sense. Traditionally, modo mirrors paper but the top 2 or 3 linear decks lose half their combined share to midrange decks. In the winner's bracket this weekend, that clearly wasn't the case with all the linear aggro floating around the top tables.
As far as EE goes, I don't run them, but I play 2 BA mainboard, which covers most of the same matchups.
This afternoon I played a local 3 rounder and went 0-2-1. Drew round one against black/white eldrazi taxes. Won game one, game two he won in turns. I just drew super poorly, elspeth and a baneslayer held him off solo forlike 8 turns, i just couldn't draw out of his blinking tks over and over. Round 2 i lose in thre to naya chord. He has a double or triple voice of resurgence opening hand all three games. Round 3 i lose to mono green stompy having one last threat to my bricks both games, never got to turn the corner.
Blessed alliance was super good in all three matches. Legit considering dropping leylines for BA 3 and verdict 4. Felt over the last few events like I was always looking for a board wipe and every time I lost a winnable game it was because of failing to find a board wipe.
Final thought: if you are willing to scoop to a resolved blood moon any time you don't have charm or purge in hand, there is the option of shocks/check lands/ colonnade/2 basics/ some ghost quarters/some reflecting pools as a nearly painless stable 3 color manabase.
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'm not dismissing anything. I tested Serum, didn't like it after multiple matches. I tested Leak, hated it. I tested Secure and switched over to it. I tested AV and didn't love it. I was saying that it was cool to see him tuning his lists, and they looked more and more streamlined as he kept 5-0ing. Today it looks like a complete 180 degree turn in the wrong direction, and there's nothing at all wrong with calling that out.
Also, just because I have more respect for the peeps on this forum doesn't mean I don't respect Wafo. I do, he's obvioulsy a great player. But a great player can do well in a tourney with a very inconsistent pile -- great players playing great cards will do great, regardless of deck tuning. But I know amalek and SES and everyone else here way better than I know Wafo, and it's no coincidence that more than a couple of us are shocked by the newest list.
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.
To anyone vehemently defying any wafo criticism, Don't fall into the trap of "well you aren't a hall of famer" bc think about it, if you (heaven forbid) got some rare illness, would you be all "I don't want any doctor to treat me unless they've also had the same illness"? Of course not. You would listen to whoever knew what they're talking about.
I'm obviously not saying wafo doesn't know what he's talking about, but I AM saying in this case maybe he got a little too ambitious / too cute for his own good. And most players who post and lurk here have won enough games (and gotten reamed in the ass for making bad calls) enough times to look at the list and say "hey that's not quite right"
You don't have to take my word for it. He went 6-5 in an open field. He did 8 5-0's , but how many days did he fail to place? People assume he was 40-0 in comp leagues, but for all anyone here knows, he was 40-100. You only see his deck lists from the days he actually x-0'd and that's the subtle flaw in putting those lists on a pedestal.
Hopefully he'll write another love letter to p Chapin for us to pour over. I'll be interested to read his thought process if anything Maybe the deck was fire and he just mulled to 3 every game. Who knows ?
And "runed halo is really good against bant eldrazi ". That is a certified fact. 2/0'd bant eldrazi twice today
Why do you assume Secure is only better than Zenith if you run 2 copies? Should he switch back to Zenith so that he can "loop it against Junk Company and beat the combo"?
Wafo originally ran a Godless Shrine. That made no sense and people eventually cut it. Why the hell are we running a second Watery Grave, though? You seriously think it's better than a Drowned Catacomb? If he found that he didn't need the fourth Colonnade (the biggest menace to the manabase by far), is adding a third Glacial Fotress so bad? I only run 4 M10 duals and 4 Colonnade, but the psychology is sound enough. And have you played Serum Vision in this deck, yet? If you're fetching a basic island turn 1 the majority of games, a M10 dual is better than a shockland the following turn. You don't lead with a shockland and fetch basics on turn 2 and/or 3 like you normally would.
Blessed Alliance is a really bad version of Lightning Helix. Really bad. It's literally only Modern playable if you're worried about Hexproof creatures or "gain 4" is worth a card. In other words, it can make the sideboard against Burn and Infect.
Test on Cockatrice? I used to do that kind of thing back when I first got back into the game and it's even lamer than playing in "Tournament Practice" on MODO.
Yes. And good luck at your next 3-round FNM. Wafo has single-handedly put up more ***PUBLISHED*** wins with the deck in a single month than everyone else put together. You do realize that he only had 2 more wins in the GP where he originally played the deck int he first place? If this was the first time this deck had been published, all of this would be starting from scratch, with nobody complaining about the remix being worse than the original.
Wait, now the man's deck is even ugly???
HOLY ****!!!
Thank you. Let's consider for a second why Wafo thought his original list was garbage in the first place. He clearly started by running the same-old list back-to-back in Dailies and decided to revamp it because he wasn't winning enough. He settles on something and lands a pile of 5-0's and people seriously think it's not stronger than the original? They still want a playset of Spell Snares?
Y'all are killing me. If Amalek throws Leylines in his maindeck and goes 0-2-2 at an FNM you analyze and test his choices but when the progenitor of the entire archetype fails to cash a GP his deck is hot garbage? I seriously had an out-of-body experience reading these last 2 pages. I just can't believe it. What y'all are considering sacred cows are what Wafo put together to play at a single GP in Worcester back in 2014. The two dominant decks have been banned out of existence, and you're seriously talking about how his original deck is the right choice.
I personally don't trust anything said on the internet, and as far as I'm concerned any non-published results don't count for anything. If people choose to foil out their paper decks to play in local 4-round events instead of investing into the most competitive way to play Magic (MODO), where most pros go to test their decks, they shouldn't go hard on the actual reliable sources of data that people have on how to play this game. Considering this thread has produced 2 cases of confirmed high-level finishes in 2 years, it should take a solid couple of months worth of testing Wafo's changes before the assumption that his new list isn't plain better than the original, is confirmed.
I don't need to be a certified M.D. to let you know that bleeding from your ears is a very bad thing.
I don't need 15 years of experience as a mechanic to tell you that smoke coming out of your car's engine is kinda dangerous.
Just sayin....
Singleton AV is sort of fine; i get the feeling he had one flex slot tuat he wasn't sure on and put in a copy of the most efficient card draw spell in the format, true to his own style. The same justification works for mana leak: you can win with ONE dead card. Of negate/leak/AV, two will aleways be live draws regardless of the matchup.
Buddy lands are OK, but you can't run too many of them and still have a functioning mana base or you start to get clunky hands of three CIPT lands too often. Really, my issues with the wafo list from this event stem from two things: a manabase that I can only think was audibled at the last minute to shore up the aggressive matchups without a lot of thought, and a mainboard that took a big departure from his SUCCESSFUL modo runs. That oint bothers me the most; he had a thing going and he changed it up a good bit in ways that clearly look less focused or planned than any of his published 5-0 lists.
As far as blessed alliance goes... you clearly haven't tested with it. It's excellent in so many ways... edicts that only hit attackers are very strong right now with the number of decks going big on a single attacker, and in attritiony matxhups it answers hard to kill threats and pads your life against chip shot damage.
As far as published results... players have crushed moderate 5 and 6 round events a good bit over the last year and a half, many of us are I'm sure like me, we refuse to buy into mtgo just because the product sucks, and at least personally, I judge more events >3 rounds than I play in by at least a factor of five, if not more. I test with a competitive group of grinders and my lists perform reasonably. also, as you should well know, winning or loosing a matchup says little about how it's positioned. What matters far more is the dynamic of the matchuP--like Identified today, finding boardwipes appears to be the relevant takeaway point for my list for the last two weeks, which leads to the action point of adding another and testing again. I may not make huge sweeping chamges regularly like others, but I don't stay on a list for very long. I just make very small changes week to week and test them thoroughly. After two years, my mana base only changes at all if I want a third ghost quarter, sideboard/mainboard cards with BB costs early, or a singleton cavern. I can justify evert aspect of my stock manabase, including the exact split on basics, why I run two watery graves, why I have a drowned catacomb instead of a filter land or glacial fortress, why I play 4 colonnades, etc. There's a reason it doesn't change: it is pretty much optimized for any configuration of spells within the range of what I would feel comfortable sleeving up.
And, FWIW, I think his GP list is unequivocally worse than the original even in the metagame of today. I would NOT say that about some of his 5-0 published lists from MTGO.
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
Okay well not true but look at it like this:
Spell snare can stop all of those things. But its not like those things arnt counterable with logic knot. Its a versatility trade. Yes spell snare hits lots of stuff. But it doesn't feel good when you face off against a 1drop heavy deck. Heck or even ad-naus. I favor logic knot because unless i didnt fetch or cast visions turn 1. I can answer anything.
Is 8 2 for 1spells not including 1-2sphinxes necissary vs discard? No hand realistically beats jund Inquisition - thoughtseize turn1,2 liliana 3. Turn 4 goyf goyf. Is going down 1 thinktwice for serum going to end you? Probably not.
3 condemn sb seems justified when you side in snap. Its not like your going to push snap to side. Just trying to look at it from a different perspective. Sometimes you just gotta use snap as ambush viper.
I mean sure. Experience goes a long way. Just before this people were rocking the runed halo main. But now i dont see it as often. I think to suggest cards being outright wrong is too harsh
Visions is #1. And we like your foils. You can use your real account now.
You had me up until the part where wafo invented draw go control. That's when we knew it was you, Guillame.
Somebody get amalek to update this the thread title guys. It's not just modern esper draw go. You WILL do as wafo says or you are NOT in the club.
*sassy finger wave*
Give me a break
I'm with amalek on "mtgo sucks I'm not spending money on that" , and it that makes my opinion invalid, oh well.
So now that we've all learned our opinions are completely irrelevant, and none of our experiences or testing matters (because we all only play 2 round fnm's against players who forgot to put spells in their deck and accidentally showed up with 75 lands) I guess we can all just go home.
It's not like Piotrowiak and Stokpile, pound for pound, put up better "in paper" results with similar lists than wafo did. Nah, screw those guys because they aren't on modo and haven't personally messaged Cipher a copy of their DC number and play history. /Sarcasm
I play in SCG events or grand prixs when I have time, I'm also a musician, Married, and work 60 hours a week doing R&D engineering for Apple. If I think mtgo sucks, and I'm not willing to just drop everything and leave my wife every weekend, but still manage to play 6-7 medium sized events per month, should that make my experiences totally irrelevant?
Where is your modo channel where you put up such amazing results? Who here has ever seen Cipher play a game of magic? I mean jesus christ dude. Nobody knows who you are and you don't even meet YOUR OWN CRITERIA for being allowed to have an opinion.
Donny is a busy guy but still finds time to crunch Caleb D ON STREAM (with a list he tweaked himself, even though he forgot to ask your permission)
That is the most off putting thing I've read in a while. What the hell is the point of even having a forum?
"Test on cockatrice? HA. I only test with a pool of former world champions. I used to do that lowly sort of thing back in the day before I wasn't just some guy *****ing about other people's opinions on the internet"
Of course this may or may not be true, because "I personally never trust anything I read on the internet" , so for all we know.....
@SES, I think Leyline is the best way to be burn. The only SB card I think is better against the deck is Kor Firewalker, which is dead against every other deck, while Grixis, BW Eldrazi, and several other t2/t3 decks (and a couple Jund players) hate Leyline. I did not play it the day of the GP, as I did not face any of those decks.
Modern - Esper Draw-Go (Best finish - 12-3, 45th at GP Charlotte 2015), Jeskai Control, UR Breach Moon
I can't wait to start testing new ideas but still have love for some of the stuff I have tried and moved on from.
Esper draw go Control!
Twitch stream: http://www.twitch.tv/pimpdonny
Don't behave like middle schoolers/neanderthals/burn players. We're all better than that. We're supposed to be enlightened, cerebral players. Everyone is entitled to an opinion, everyone is welcome to share it, and nobody is going to get anything out of the thread if we don't behave civilly. I watch donnie's stream quite often, and I would say I disagree with many of the build and line of play decisions that he makes, but I understand why he makes them and respect the tradeoffs. My conservative tendancy caused me to take a draw yesterday where donnie's playstyle would likely have been able to pull out a win in three games. Equally, I feel less comfortable pushing for serum visions to find the right half of the deck, preferring to build as close to a 50/50 deck as I can and rely on experience and practice to carry me; others of you (cough SES cough) feel more comfortable taking bigger gambles on the metagame. I would say I probably have the most consistent performance of reported results with the deck, but I don't have the best results, not by a long shot. I 3-0 or 2-1 more frequently than could be necessarily expected, but I've only played three long events with the deck, to a combined 15-9 record. It's a decent record, but it's not super stellar. I test a lot, and my win percentage there mirrors that large event record-- a tad under 66% win rate. Very good in the grand scheme of things, but not enough events to expect a major (good) result.
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 think I honestly wanna go back to the original iteration of the deck with a eye towards aggro as public enemy number 1. Wafo was right in ruling out tron and dredge as things to try and fight and burn even with a ton of hate cards can still power thru, I have accepted that we will never be able to beat every deck in the format it's just to wide open but I'm more then fine with a ton of 50/50 match ups and ones where the 60/40 is decided on play skill along with correct sb choices.
I'll be aiming to test both the resto heavy Ses build we are brewing as well as updates to original Wafo esper as I think both have merit. It's gonna be a great couple weeks of brews and think tank time.
Esper draw go Control!
Twitch stream: http://www.twitch.tv/pimpdonny
Honestly I think the sweet spot for snare in modern right now is 2 or 0 and you should run it only if you play 3 plus snapcasters. Affinity is no where near the numbers it has been on and jund although the most popular deck is already beat by draw and removal.
Edit: As for the Wafo list I agree with a lot of the overall concepts in it. It seemed like Wafo more stuff to dump into the yard for the extra logic knot snd a better curve which serum visions fills. The other reason for serum visions is the realization that the deck relies on seeing certain cards to even have a chance of winning such as verdict against heavy creature decks. In that case the added velocity is important to guarentee turn 4 board wipe without running more than 4 of them. In other words you see your best answers more often rather than having more answers. Less shocks also makes sense with actual turn 1 plays in the deck.
Negate and msnaleak flex spots and could be judt about snything else from what I can tell. yhe things I had problems with is his board. Wafo decided to ignore some matchups and just give up on them as he admitted himself. I believe his day 2 losses were due to running into linear decks that he chose to ignore suck as dredge, and burn. The sideboard just seemed to be aimed at zoo, infect, and merfolk.
As far as tolaria west goes, just play a second explosives. Tormod's crypt sucks compared to relic and if you are in a match where ancestral is good, then spending 3 mana to go find it is probably bad.
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 don't know what category of logical fallacy that post falls under, but obviously the whole forum is full of opinions, and nobody ever said opinions are only valid if someone is a hall of famer.
My point was that you guys collectively dumpstered his entire new decklist, called it garbage and used his failure to cash a GP as justification for hating on fundamentally different approach to the archetype. The irony is that analyzing what he decided was a better version of the deck is the most likely thing to result in a Tier 1 or Tier 1.5 deck. But no, people seem to be under the impression that this deck is already where it needs to be, because they read about someone's FNM and win-a-box results.
But it's really not. I used to play in local Modern and Legacy tournaments; I even top 4'd a Goyf tournament and a PPTQ with this deck. The same month I ran this online and never managed to 5-0 a league. The competition is stiffer than most any smaller (50 or less players) event you're going to find on paper. I take the deck to a GP and hit the same brick wall. I look on this forum and nobody has cracked it, either. I've been infinite in paper FNMs for as long as I can remember, with all of my deck updates coming from other people's prize money. I failed to Day 2 the last GP I was at. There's a glass ceiling above the local tournament level that you're just not seeing.
Then comes Wafo, who warps the maindeck and puts up more 5-0's in a 30-day period than most full-time MODO grinders. Sounds like a potentially Tier 1 deck to me. And...the entire thread rejects the final list completely off-hand.
That's the problem with forums: "...the opinion of the village idiot is given the same weight as the opinion of aristotle".
So, what tech out of the newest lists look most promising? I dont love Serum in the deck, but I will admit that just a little selection goes a long way here. Makes me want to play with Anticipate/Telling Time again.
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.
Byes are awarded for the first 3 rounds because those are the 3 easiest of the entire tournament. It's very unlikely he would have even taken a loss in the first 3 rounds, and comparing his run with the run of someone with no byes is essentially the same as adding 3 free wins to their record. The man went x-5 at a GP and finished outside the money. That's the relative measure that's used to compare GP results. You can't hack the numbers and apply them to your FNM results; even if the hack was legitimate the 11 rounds he played at the GP were at a much higher level. The 3 loses he took Day 2 were against other great pro/semi-pro players that also were on a run at the GP. These are the kind of grinders that would be at your FNM keeping you around till 2 a.m. so they could play it all out and take all the prize money
The changes between his GP list and the MODO lists is basically 2 additional Serum Visions. The cards he cut (26th land and second Secure the Wastes) in my mind make perfect sense and are changes I'd already made (never ran double Secure), or had been considering making for a long time (26th land in a deck so prone to flooding is overkill). He likely wasn't finished tweaking by the GP date, given the 1-of Ancestral, but I'm personally testing a full playset of Serum Visions with 25 land before checking out different options.
I hear him on "Think Twice being slow", but I think he made a fundamental mistake by slotting an Ancestral in it's place. I would never have considered trimming the card, but when you run an entire playset of Serum Visions, the deck's velocity changes and it makes sense to go down on Divination effects. I always thought you couldn't trim Think twice, but I also never considered you could make room for an entire set of Serum Visions and have the deck still function. I'm looking for a way to cut 2 Think Twice for testing, but with 8 removal spells and 10 counters, it's difficult to add anything without skewing the maindeck towards certain matchups, and the maindeck suffers against both the aggro and combo extremes of the metagame.