Regarding Ballista, I tested it a bit and found that I had enough creature removal regardless and it rarely made a difference. That said, I don't think having a single copy is a bad idea: it's useful for all the reasons you indicated.
As for Copter, a cool thing is that it makes Martyr/Ascendant/Hawk each hit for 3/turn if you're not under pressure. I have definitely won games by casting Martyr, using it to activate Copter, and swinging several times. It's not great versus aggro, but is really strong in grindier matchups as it turns extra Hawks and such into more useful things.
A lot of great suggestions here. As a lot of people know, I've been mixing things up and going away from the traditional build for years, but upon playing the list I posted above, I'm finding the simple version has been the most effective. Field of Ruin is absolutely excellent and Wayfarer should be maindeck even if you're not on a multi-color build, as well. I've yet to hit scary matchups, but so far, I'm 7-0-1 and the only thing I didn't beat was a guy not scooping to me after I illustrated how he would lose. Wins are 2 Titan decks (which I could never beat in the past), A Token deck, a jank tank deck, two Death's Shadow, and Storm.
I think the light Blue splash feels amazing. Wrath is rarely better than a Verdict and D-Sphere is so much better than O-ring. With Fields and Flagstones, it's been remarkably easy to go find my 1-of Farmland or 1-of Basic Island.
The blue splash may end up with some resemblance to the Azorius Titan deck. While I think those two cards are very good, the question is whether it is worth the added weakness to Moon effects and occasional color-screw.
Problems with Blood moons starting from 3rd color usually. It's very very hard to play around Blood moon in 2 colors.
From experience, this is less true for us than most decks. We've got Emeria, Mistveil Plains, GQ, FoR making about half our lands nonbasic right off the bat. To regularly have U by turn 3-4, you'd want roughly 10 sources in our roughly remaining 12 land slots. The upshot is that we may have enough Plains to play W, but there is a non-significant chance of Moon shutting us out of U.
I agree. Blood Moon and Blood Sun are already terrible for us because Emeria is the way we win any non-aggro matchup. They're going to get it down in Game 2 once they see what we do or in Game 1 if they've ever played us before. It hurts us way worse on splash and 3-color builds, but it's an easy way to screw us out of the WW we need for Wrath in mono-colored builds. Less so with Blood Sun, obviously, as Emeria and Mistveil will still let us cast things. In reality, we want people to switch over to Blood Sun from the Blood Moons so badly.
From experience, this is less true for us than most decks. We've got Emeria, Mistveil Plains, GQ, FoR making about half our lands nonbasic right off the bat. To regularly have U by turn 3-4, you'd want roughly 10 sources in our roughly remaining 12 land slots. The upshot is that we may have enough Plains to play W, but there is a non-significant chance of Moon shutting us out of U.
The thing is, my (granted) limited testing says its fine. In most cases, I either use Flagstones to go get Farmland (or Mistveil and a Basic Island if I'm GQing my own Flagstones, which makes sense to do in so many matchups), or I can use Field of Ruin before they get Blood Moon down. I'll give you that my testing is very limited, but it hasn't been any sort of problem yet, as turn 3 is a dead turn if you don't have Ghostly Prison anyway, and that's usually the turn I'm using to Field of Ruin something of their's or fix my mana (With Flagstones and Ghost Quarter, I can do this while still casting Ghostly Prison and by then, I should know how badly I need to save my land destruction for them. In many cases, I don't really.)
It's not stable on colors but has pretty nice protection from Blood Sun and 4 GQ returned so with Renegade Rallier we can send land based decks in hell.
Went 4-0 at modern monday with the list I posted on the last page beating Grixis Midrange 2-0 (looked like Death Shadow, didn't actually see Death's shadow), Burn 2-1, Mono Blue Living End 1-0-1, and then Burn 2-0.
Most noteworthy thing is that I mulled to 5 on the play vs burn in both game 1s on purpose because I knew they were on burn and I wanted to make sure my hand wasn't too slow.
Round 2 was a guy who was new to town so he had not played against me before. He played normally and beat me on turn 4, when all I really needed to do was untap with ranger. The finals were against a guy that I beat regularly so he knew what I was up to and I think that did him a disservice. I had kept a 1 lander and scryed a martyr to the top. He assumed I was sandbagging a land to make him tap out so I could slam a martyr and gain life, so he didn't really cast much while I was stuck on 1 land. Eventually I landed the martyr, blocked with it and sac'd but he had the skullcrack. Unfortunately for him I had orzhov charm and was able to martyr the following turn undoing all of his work. I think I would have lost that game had he not been playing around martyr so much in the first few turns, which is kind of funny.
I'm pretty sure I'm playing something similar to this list this weekend at the SCG Dallas, probably only change would be to go up to 3 or 4 field of ruin
@Demanic
I like having 4 Ghost Quarter because my typical line against Tron is too spend my first few turns tutoring ghost quarter and destroying Tron lands. 2 Mana is so much in the early game where killing Tron matters the most. With crucible of worlds and wayfarer you can recover the land disadvantage or by just pathing your own guys.
As long as you have 2-3, you can still get into Strip Mine range, which is where you want to be. At that point, Field of Ruin stops the issue where you're sandbagging lands to always be able to fetch Ghost Quarter with Wayfarer. Too often, we can lose to slowing ourselves down by attacking their mana but they can still cast their nonsense when they get to six lands and if we're not ready to fight that, we lose.
Something relevant to note with Wayfarer is you can really make good use of activation and triggered abilities on the stack to get more mileage. IE: you can play your second Flagstones or activate GQ/FoR, then in response to the fetch trigger you activate Wayfarer. This minor thing with timing is easy to miss if you're not familiar with the deck, but can yield a lot of extra land searches.
@Demanic
I like having 4 Ghost Quarter because my typical line against Tron is too spend my first few turns tutoring ghost quarter and destroying Tron lands. 2 Mana is so much in the early game where killing Tron matters the most. With crucible of worlds and wayfarer you can recover the land disadvantage or by just pathing your own guys.
FoR gives you an untapped land, it only costs 1 more mana than Ghost Quarter which you make up for the next turn by having +1 land. Crucible of worlds only lets you stay at the same number of lands you had with GQ, it lets you be positive with FoR.
I also think that flagstones loses its place in martyr with the advent of FoR because you don't need it to convert your lands into plains.
Your idea is interesting and really different from the usual strategy, because it actually eliminates the three recursion engines of the deck (1-Proclamation/Martyr/Serra, 2-Hawks/Mistveil, 3-Emeria) .
I love the idea of the Cataclysmic Gearhulk, it punish those decks that go wide (all Aggro decks, Aura, Latern Control and Token decks) reducing the need of Wrath in the maindeck.
I believe that the shocklands are better in this case because you can actually search then with the fetchlands. The Wildwood is a more logical option for a stable mana base while still being a creature.
I think the Academy Ruins is somewhat forced in the deck, the only use it has is to return the Gearhulk and is not a game breaking move like an Engineered Explosives or protection for Crucible of Worlds.
I believe that Gideon of the Trials is a better planeswalker for the deck than Tamiyo, Field Researcher, it is another lock against combo and control, and it's other ability keeps in cheek the creature that survives the Gearhulk. I think that the Tamiyo will be better in the sideboard and be searched with the wish
In the Sideboard I would change the Blood Baron of Vizkopa for a Sigarda, Host of Herons, the Oblivion Ring for a Detention Sphere and the Grave-Shell Scarab for Supreme Veredict.
@madudu2
Hey, forgive me for being direct here, I think it is really awesome that you are brewing a fun deck with Martyr of sands in it, you definitely don't have a martyr proc deck there so I'm not sure that this is the best place to talk about it. Your deck, while lacking in win conditions, isn't really a control deck and features no late game presence. I have a big long critique of your deck I can PM you though if you want it
Best of luck!
@Demanic
I like having 4 Ghost Quarter because my typical line against Tron is too spend my first few turns tutoring ghost quarter and destroying Tron lands. 2 Mana is so much in the early game where killing Tron matters the most. With crucible of worlds and wayfarer you can recover the land disadvantage or by just pathing your own guys.
FoR gives you an untapped land, it only costs 1 more mana than Ghost Quarter which you make up for the next turn by having +1 land. Crucible of worlds only lets you stay at the same number of lands you had with GQ, it lets you be positive with FoR.
I also think that flagstones loses its place in martyr with the advent of FoR because you don't need it to convert your lands into plains.
It costs 2 more mana than ghost quarter. Being on the draw feels real bad vs tron when you have a field of ruin and not a ghost quarter
@soccerfanxl
Field of ruin costs 2 mana to use, ghost quarter costs 1.
If you have 2 plains and a utility land in play you have 3 mana.
If you have 2 plains and a ghost quarter in play and you ghost quarter one of their lands you have 2 mana left.
If you have 2 plains and a field of ruin in play and you field of ruin one of their lands you have 1 mana left.
As for Copter, a cool thing is that it makes Martyr/Ascendant/Hawk each hit for 3/turn if you're not under pressure. I have definitely won games by casting Martyr, using it to activate Copter, and swinging several times. It's not great versus aggro, but is really strong in grindier matchups as it turns extra Hawks and such into more useful things.
Modern: Merfolk UU // Green Devotion GG // SkRed Red RR
Legacy: Death & Taxes WW // Burn RR // Death's Shadow Delver UB
Commander: Brago UW // Karlov WB
Modern: Merfolk UU // Green Devotion GG // SkRed Red RR
Legacy: Death & Taxes WW // Burn RR // Death's Shadow Delver UB
Commander: Brago UW // Karlov WB
From experience, this is less true for us than most decks. We've got Emeria, Mistveil Plains, GQ, FoR making about half our lands nonbasic right off the bat. To regularly have U by turn 3-4, you'd want roughly 10 sources in our roughly remaining 12 land slots. The upshot is that we may have enough Plains to play W, but there is a non-significant chance of Moon shutting us out of U.
Modern: Merfolk UU // Green Devotion GG // SkRed Red RR
Legacy: Death & Taxes WW // Burn RR // Death's Shadow Delver UB
Commander: Brago UW // Karlov WB
The thing is, my (granted) limited testing says its fine. In most cases, I either use Flagstones to go get Farmland (or Mistveil and a Basic Island if I'm GQing my own Flagstones, which makes sense to do in so many matchups), or I can use Field of Ruin before they get Blood Moon down. I'll give you that my testing is very limited, but it hasn't been any sort of problem yet, as turn 3 is a dead turn if you don't have Ghostly Prison anyway, and that's usually the turn I'm using to Field of Ruin something of their's or fix my mana (With Flagstones and Ghost Quarter, I can do this while still casting Ghostly Prison and by then, I should know how badly I need to save my land destruction for them. In many cases, I don't really.)
Here's my mana based for reference
4 Ghost Quarter
4 Flagstones of Trokair
2 Field of Ruin
2 Mistveil Plains
2 Emeria, The Sky Ruin
1 Irrigated Farmland
1 Island
1 Crucible of Worlds
Actually, with new Blood Sun I rebuilt Bant with Wishes:
2 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
4 Flagstones of Trokair
4 Ghost Quarter
1 Gavony Township
1 Forest
1 Island
2 Plains
1 Irrigated Farmland
2 Mistveil Plains
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Temple Garden
1cc (12):
4 Path to exile
4 Martyr pf sands
2 Thraben Inspector
1 Kami of False Hope
1 Weathered wayfarer
4 Squadron Hawk
4 Glittering Wish
4 Runed Halo
3cc (7):
4 Renegade Rallier
1 Crucible of Worlds
2 Proclamation of rebirth
4cc (6):
3 Ranger of Eos
3 Supreme Verdict
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Caustic Caterpillar
1 Hex Parasite
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Sphinx of the Final Word
1 Safewright Quest
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Meddling Mage
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Fracturing Gust
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Sky Hussar
1 Venser, the Sojourner
It's not stable on colors but has pretty nice protection from Blood Sun and 4 GQ returned so with Renegade Rallier we can send land based decks in hell.
Most noteworthy thing is that I mulled to 5 on the play vs burn in both game 1s on purpose because I knew they were on burn and I wanted to make sure my hand wasn't too slow.
Round 2 was a guy who was new to town so he had not played against me before. He played normally and beat me on turn 4, when all I really needed to do was untap with ranger. The finals were against a guy that I beat regularly so he knew what I was up to and I think that did him a disservice. I had kept a 1 lander and scryed a martyr to the top. He assumed I was sandbagging a land to make him tap out so I could slam a martyr and gain life, so he didn't really cast much while I was stuck on 1 land. Eventually I landed the martyr, blocked with it and sac'd but he had the skullcrack. Unfortunately for him I had orzhov charm and was able to martyr the following turn undoing all of his work. I think I would have lost that game had he not been playing around martyr so much in the first few turns, which is kind of funny.
I'm pretty sure I'm playing something similar to this list this weekend at the SCG Dallas, probably only change would be to go up to 3 or 4 field of ruin
Modern: MartyrProc (Control/Prison) Check out my Primer!
Commander: Karador
Pauper: Ub Reanimator
Legacy: Young Frankenstein/Dredge/The Spanish Inquisition
Casual: 5Color Zendikar Combo
MartyrProc
Daily Digest
MartyrProc. List citation is incorrect.
tWoo Brew off
twitter: @Dave_Cordeiro
Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheBizarroDavid
Modern: Merfolk UU // Green Devotion GG // SkRed Red RR
Legacy: Death & Taxes WW // Burn RR // Death's Shadow Delver UB
Commander: Brago UW // Karlov WB
I like having 4 Ghost Quarter because my typical line against Tron is too spend my first few turns tutoring ghost quarter and destroying Tron lands. 2 Mana is so much in the early game where killing Tron matters the most. With crucible of worlds and wayfarer you can recover the land disadvantage or by just pathing your own guys.
Martyr Proc Thread
Esper Relicblade Thread
Standard:
Mardu Superfriends
Turbofog
Modern: Merfolk UU // Green Devotion GG // SkRed Red RR
Legacy: Death & Taxes WW // Burn RR // Death's Shadow Delver UB
Commander: Brago UW // Karlov WB
FoR gives you an untapped land, it only costs 1 more mana than Ghost Quarter which you make up for the next turn by having +1 land. Crucible of worlds only lets you stay at the same number of lands you had with GQ, it lets you be positive with FoR.
I also think that flagstones loses its place in martyr with the advent of FoR because you don't need it to convert your lands into plains.
Modern: MartyrProc (Control/Prison) Check out my Primer!
Commander: Karador
Pauper: Ub Reanimator
Legacy: Young Frankenstein/Dredge/The Spanish Inquisition
Casual: 5Color Zendikar Combo
MartyrProc
Daily Digest
MartyrProc. List citation is incorrect.
tWoo Brew off
twitter: @Dave_Cordeiro
Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheBizarroDavid
Your idea is interesting and really different from the usual strategy, because it actually eliminates the three recursion engines of the deck (1-Proclamation/Martyr/Serra, 2-Hawks/Mistveil, 3-Emeria) .
I love the idea of the Cataclysmic Gearhulk, it punish those decks that go wide (all Aggro decks, Aura, Latern Control and Token decks) reducing the need of Wrath in the maindeck.
Just one question, Why the Grave-Shell Scarab?
From your deck, I would make these changes:
Out: 1 Sunpetal Grove, 1 Glacial Fortress, 1 Isolated Chapel, 2 Forbidding Watchtower.
In: 1 Temple Garden, 1 Hallowed Fountain, 1 Godless Shrine, 2 Stirring Wildwood.
I believe that the shocklands are better in this case because you can actually search then with the fetchlands. The Wildwood is a more logical option for a stable mana base while still being a creature.
I think the Academy Ruins is somewhat forced in the deck, the only use it has is to return the Gearhulk and is not a game breaking move like an Engineered Explosives or protection for Crucible of Worlds.
I believe that Gideon of the Trials is a better planeswalker for the deck than Tamiyo, Field Researcher, it is another lock against combo and control, and it's other ability keeps in cheek the creature that survives the Gearhulk. I think that the Tamiyo will be better in the sideboard and be searched with the wish
In the Sideboard I would change the Blood Baron of Vizkopa for a Sigarda, Host of Herons, the Oblivion Ring for a Detention Sphere and the Grave-Shell Scarab for Supreme Veredict.
Hey, forgive me for being direct here, I think it is really awesome that you are brewing a fun deck with Martyr of sands in it, you definitely don't have a martyr proc deck there so I'm not sure that this is the best place to talk about it. Your deck, while lacking in win conditions, isn't really a control deck and features no late game presence. I have a big long critique of your deck I can PM you though if you want it
Best of luck!
Modern: MartyrProc (Control/Prison) Check out my Primer!
Commander: Karador
Pauper: Ub Reanimator
Legacy: Young Frankenstein/Dredge/The Spanish Inquisition
Casual: 5Color Zendikar Combo
MartyrProc
Daily Digest
MartyrProc. List citation is incorrect.
tWoo Brew off
twitter: @Dave_Cordeiro
Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheBizarroDavid
It costs 2 more mana than ghost quarter. Being on the draw feels real bad vs tron when you have a field of ruin and not a ghost quarter
Field of ruin costs 2 mana to use, ghost quarter costs 1.
If you have 2 plains and a utility land in play you have 3 mana.
If you have 2 plains and a ghost quarter in play and you ghost quarter one of their lands you have 2 mana left.
If you have 2 plains and a field of ruin in play and you field of ruin one of their lands you have 1 mana left.
Modern: MartyrProc (Control/Prison) Check out my Primer!
Commander: Karador
Pauper: Ub Reanimator
Legacy: Young Frankenstein/Dredge/The Spanish Inquisition
Casual: 5Color Zendikar Combo
MartyrProc
Daily Digest
MartyrProc. List citation is incorrect.
tWoo Brew off
twitter: @Dave_Cordeiro
Youtube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheBizarroDavid