With castle you can't kill the 5 toughness creature with a bolt and still have geist survive.
But anyways, I don't think it's viable to play either cos of manabase restrictions.
Agreed. Do you have a deck list for playing both serum and opt?
Could you explain why you're running 2 snare instead of lyze axman? I like lyze more in that slot. I too took about this list with a different sideboard to FNM, went 2-2, but with lyze instead of snare.
Could you explain why you're running 2 snare instead of lyze axman? I like lyze more in that slot. I too took about this list with a different sideboard to FNM, went 2-2, but with lyze instead of snare.
A) I've always felt like you wanted x8 counters with Jeskai. Historically... nearly every single list that has done well over the last 1-2 years have had 8 counter spells. I'm always nervous going less. At FNM spell snare was irrelevant though because I never drew it.
B) I've never liked electrolyze. The only matchups where I have ever "wanted" electrolye is affinity or elves (and it's not even a necessity vs those decks). Against other creature decks its "ok" (hey it cantrips). Against midrange, control, and eldrazi/tron the only good thing about it is it cantrips.
I based my list on the Jeskai list that won the open, and had to cut something for x4 opts. Since I wanted to keep 8 counters, chose the electrolyze.
I wouldn't recommend going down to 22 lands or cutting Colonnades just because you play 4/4 split with SV/Opt. Snap cryptic chains and Colonnade beats are one of the most potent things you can do with this deck. It gives us reach in grindy MUs and bigger density threat and in my experience 22 lands is just to few to consistently get to 6 mana.
Opt is a great addition but I feel some of you a seriously overrating the card.
It's the Xerox rule. With 8 cantrips you don't need more than 22 lands. If you are going to play that many cantrips... I don't think you want more than 22. that really risks flooding out. Last night I got flooded alot with only 22 lands.
People seriously misuse readily available info. The Xerox rules works but how far down the cantrips dig also affects the probability. Ponder versus Opt is a huge swing.
People seriously misuse readily available info. The Xerox rules works but how far down the cantrips dig also affects the probability. Ponder versus Opt is a huge swing.
Agreed. That's why you can only go down to 22 lands. (I think the actual rule is 2 lands for every 2-4 cantrips. In this case you are only giving up one land for every four cantrips).
Also: grixis control has been on the 22 land 8 cantrip plan for years. That's actually what gave me the idea (not just the "rule"). I used to play Grixis Control and when someone mentioned playing both opt and serum visions side by side - the first thing that popped into my head was "would that mean we could go down to 22 lands?"
I wouldn't recommend going down to 22 lands or cutting Colonnades just because you play 4/4 split with SV/Opt. Snap cryptic chains and Colonnade beats are one of the most potent things you can do with this deck. It gives us reach in grindy MUs and bigger density threat and in my experience 22 lands is just to few to consistently get to 6 mana.
Opt is a great addition but I feel some of you a seriously overrating the card.
It's the Xerox rule. With 8 cantrips you don't need more than 22 lands. If you are going to play that many cantrips... I don't think you want more than 22. that really risks flooding out. Last night I got flooded alot with only 22 lands.
don't know why this hype for suddenly playing like 8 can trips out of nowhere. We are not gds which is simply trying to deploy early threats and the cantrips synergizes well with the game plan. We are not storm or ad nauseam which just cantrips to close the game as early as possible. The strenght of the deck is his redundancy and consistency. In a lot of games I did lose with a lot of cards in hand simply because I had no tempo advantage to cast those cantrips. The initial topic was will opt replace serum visions? From that point suddenly it became "let's go with 8 cantrips ". Doesn't make sense to me. 4/4 seems way too many for me.
See above. Grixis control is what gave me the idea. If the only thing you cut is 2 lands and 2 electrolyze,you are not loosing redundancy nor consistency (I would argue you are actually increasing it). Less lands, more cantrrips mean your top-decks are going to be 100% better (in theory). And I've never liked electrolyze so it was an easy cut. The only question becomes can you support 22 lands with 8 cantrips (and so far it looks like yes).
In terms of my opinion regarding opt, I have switched opinions based on play testing. I actually think Opt is better vs non-blue decks. It allows you to draw the answer you need quicker and at instant speed. The problem was that against other blue decks playing serum visions (and a lesser extent grindy matchups), it was not providing enough CA to keep up alone.
I will say: I do like serum visions and opt together. They work really really really well together especially with cryptic command.
i've stated my feelings with playing more than 4 cantrips before but playing more than 4 seems too much without affecting the board... cards like serum and sleight of hand and opt are like taxes on your mana.... this doesn't become evident until you play against someone like burn or even affinity... more than 2 or 3 cantrips will increase your likelihood of losing very heavily because you'll be far behind on tempo... GDS can do it because their wincons are one mana also...
the best thing you could do is hold up countermagic on turn 2 or remove a threat.... 8 cantrips means you will be devoting the first two turns to cantripping a large majority of the time... or you will be cantripping a lot in the later turns... i think that's fine if the card you are trying to find wins you the game but bolts, electrolyzes, queller and cryptic only move the win percentages slightly... and the queller lists don't have a problem with consistency so you're making it less dense for marginal... if any.. gains... but if you choose to play the opts then you want as few tapped lands as possible...
as for stony... i prefer it but i've seen many lists not play it... my theory is that even if the matchup is good if you have a sideboard card that moves the matchup a lot then it's worth it... moving a matchup 10% affects your winrate the same if it's at 50% or 70% and affinity is still very popular and capable of making deep runs the moment folks leave home their artifact hate... i always have a rule to never have less than one in my sb... but i've been running into enough ad nauseam and lantern that it's not some narrow card either...
i've stated my feelings with playing more than 4 cantrips before but playing more than 4 seems too much without affecting the board... cards like serum and sleight of hand and opt are like taxes on your mana.... this doesn't become evident until you play against someone like burn or even affinity... more than 2 or 3 cantrips will increase your likelihood of losing very heavily because you'll be far behind on tempo... GDS can do it because their wincons are one mana also...
the best thing you could do is hold up countermagic on turn 2 or remove a threat.... 8 cantrips means you will be devoting the first two turns to cantripping a large majority of the time... or you will be cantripping a lot in the later turns... i think that's fine if the card you are trying to find wins you the game but bolts, electrolyzes, queller and cryptic only move the win percentages slightly... and the queller lists don't have a problem with consistency so you're making it less dense for marginal... if any.. gains... but if you choose to play the opts then you want as few tapped lands as possible...
as for stony... i prefer it but i've seen many lists not play it... my theory is that even if the matchup is good if you have a sideboard card that moves the matchup a lot then it's worth it... moving a matchup 10% affects your winrate the same if it's at 50% or 70% and affinity is still very popular and capable of making deep runs the moment folks leave home their artifact hate... i always have a rule to never have less than one in my sb... but i've been running into enough ad nauseam and lantern that it's not some narrow card either...
Except opt is instant speed. I agree - sorcery speed cantrips do tax your mana. That's why we've never played slight of hand + serum visions because it would be too slow, painfully so. But being instant... opens up the distinct possibility.
I'll post a tournement result when I get back. taking the above list to a PPTQ today.
At the moment I view opt to Jeskai as Thoughtscour is for Grixis.
I'd love to see your report. What you said about Snare makes sense, thanks for that.
Ended up missing pptq top 8. Went 4-2.
Below for detailed matches
Match One: Bant Eldrazi 2-1
Game 1 I am on the play. Get lucky and curve out perfectly. End up beating my opponent with two reality smashers on the field thanks to helix and Snapcasters.
Game 2: He has turn three Thoughtseer with cavern. I quickly get over run.
Game 3: spell queller wins me this game.
Match Two: Jund 1-2
Won a very Grindy game 1. Having 8 cantrips really helped steal this game.
In game 2, a combination of being mana screwed and being unable to deal with a turn 2 bob into lilli spelled doom for me.
Game 3 I mis-sideboarded. Kept in 3 spell queller instead of Geist. Flooded out and had him at 7 with s useless queller in my hand.
Match 3. Burn 1-2
Drew two helixss game 1, but didn't draw enough lands to hit snapcaster or pay off cards, ended up loosing. Won game 2 fairly easy. Game 3 was extremely close (got him down to 7 life). Came down to not drawing any helixes.
Match 4: Affinity. 2-0
Dominated this matchup.
Match 5: storm. 2-1.
Game 1 he had the turn 4 kill through counter magic. Game 2 he had empyty for 8 on turn 2, but I had bolt, path, and followed it up with Geist. Was able to race him. Game 3 I dominated with more control magic and removal.
Match 6: scape shift 2-0 (gave me win)
Got the pair down, guy gave me win. We played a few matches. If you have a turn 2 counter followed by a Geist (on play) that is how you win this matchup.
Overall 4-2. A few notes: I did get mana screwed considerably with only 22 lands. And I did have those awkward hands where I had three cantrips and only two lands...
That being said: I really liked opt and visions side by side. I might try adding a colonnade back and cutting one cantrip. (3 serum visions, 4 opts, 23 lands). Or just keep experimenting with the greedy build of only 22 lands.
My 2 doubts are:
a) Chandra, I put it to function as a finisher, but I don't know if it's too janky
b) Opt x Serum, I prefer Serum for now, but are there any arguments for opt is this kind of deck?
Chandra being sorcery-speed and not a game-breaking planeswalker is very awkward, especially considering that she doesn't protect herself.
If you prefer a more flexible deck as far as being able to cast "what you want when want," Opt is better. If digging matters more, Serum Visions is for you. I think the jury is still out on which one this deck would want or the numbers on both if the deck ends up with both.
My 2 doubts are:
a) Chandra, I put it to function as a finisher, but I don't know if it's too janky
b) Opt x Serum, I prefer Serum for now, but are there any arguments for opt is this kind of deck?
Thanks a lot!
Opt has strong arguments for giving Jeskai the option to hold up mana for counters/quellers/burn. We also run a lot of 3-and-4-of's in our deck, many of which offer redundancy to the game plan. This could mean that the loss of a scry is less impactful for us than decks that may run many singletons or 2-ofs. In some sideboard games I can see Serum Visions being a lot better. I am testing with 4 opt / 2 Serum Visions.
Jeskai is not quite the right home for any of Chandra's +1 abilities. Her first ability often reveals a counter-spell, or tempts you to tap out in your own turn, which can open you up. Her second +1 is sorcery speed red mana, so not only can we not use it to play our counter-spells, but we have no double red in our deck unless you run Thundermaw Hellkite or Anger of the Gods. We also only run 6-12 red spells in the deck, so her ultimate may be less reliable than in mono-R or R/W prison.
I'm not saying her +1 abilities don't generate value for us in some way, but not optimally. Her -3 does technically defend herself though. I would agree that Ajani Vengeant is a better walker for the archetype. Depending on which part of the meta you want to target, some other cards that synergise well with a Jeskai game-plan and close games out are;
Agreed. Do you have a deck list for playing both serum and opt?
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
4 Spell Queller
3 Geist of Saint Traft
3 Island
1 Plains
3 Celestial Colonnade
4 Flooded Strand
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
2 Sulfur Falls
3 Cryptic Command
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Lightning Helix
3 Logic Knot
4 Path to Exile
2 Spell Snare
4 Serum Visions
4 Opt
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Izzet Staticaster
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Dispel
1 Negate
1 Wear
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Supreme Verdict
2 Stony Silence
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
Beat elves, counter company, and eldrazi taxes. Lost vs bant eldrazi.
I really love going to 22 lands with 8 canttips. Feels natural. Never was mana screwed. Top decks were amazing.
Unfortunately I don't think you want more than 2 colonnades if you go to 22.
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
UWR Control
BR Hollow One
A) I've always felt like you wanted x8 counters with Jeskai. Historically... nearly every single list that has done well over the last 1-2 years have had 8 counter spells. I'm always nervous going less. At FNM spell snare was irrelevant though because I never drew it.
B) I've never liked electrolyze. The only matchups where I have ever "wanted" electrolye is affinity or elves (and it's not even a necessity vs those decks). Against other creature decks its "ok" (hey it cantrips). Against midrange, control, and eldrazi/tron the only good thing about it is it cantrips.
I based my list on the Jeskai list that won the open, and had to cut something for x4 opts. Since I wanted to keep 8 counters, chose the electrolyze.
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
100% agree. Cut two colonnades when I went down to 22 lands.
Do you think we can get away with cutting stony silence?
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
It's the Xerox rule. With 8 cantrips you don't need more than 22 lands. If you are going to play that many cantrips... I don't think you want more than 22. that really risks flooding out. Last night I got flooded alot with only 22 lands.
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
Agreed. That's why you can only go down to 22 lands. (I think the actual rule is 2 lands for every 2-4 cantrips. In this case you are only giving up one land for every four cantrips).
Also: grixis control has been on the 22 land 8 cantrip plan for years. That's actually what gave me the idea (not just the "rule"). I used to play Grixis Control and when someone mentioned playing both opt and serum visions side by side - the first thing that popped into my head was "would that mean we could go down to 22 lands?"
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
See above. Grixis control is what gave me the idea. If the only thing you cut is 2 lands and 2 electrolyze,you are not loosing redundancy nor consistency (I would argue you are actually increasing it). Less lands, more cantrrips mean your top-decks are going to be 100% better (in theory). And I've never liked electrolyze so it was an easy cut. The only question becomes can you support 22 lands with 8 cantrips (and so far it looks like yes).
In terms of my opinion regarding opt, I have switched opinions based on play testing. I actually think Opt is better vs non-blue decks. It allows you to draw the answer you need quicker and at instant speed. The problem was that against other blue decks playing serum visions (and a lesser extent grindy matchups), it was not providing enough CA to keep up alone.
I will say: I do like serum visions and opt together. They work really really really well together especially with cryptic command.
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
the best thing you could do is hold up countermagic on turn 2 or remove a threat.... 8 cantrips means you will be devoting the first two turns to cantripping a large majority of the time... or you will be cantripping a lot in the later turns... i think that's fine if the card you are trying to find wins you the game but bolts, electrolyzes, queller and cryptic only move the win percentages slightly... and the queller lists don't have a problem with consistency so you're making it less dense for marginal... if any.. gains... but if you choose to play the opts then you want as few tapped lands as possible...
as for stony... i prefer it but i've seen many lists not play it... my theory is that even if the matchup is good if you have a sideboard card that moves the matchup a lot then it's worth it... moving a matchup 10% affects your winrate the same if it's at 50% or 70% and affinity is still very popular and capable of making deep runs the moment folks leave home their artifact hate... i always have a rule to never have less than one in my sb... but i've been running into enough ad nauseam and lantern that it's not some narrow card either...
Except opt is instant speed. I agree - sorcery speed cantrips do tax your mana. That's why we've never played slight of hand + serum visions because it would be too slow, painfully so. But being instant... opens up the distinct possibility.
I'll post a tournement result when I get back. taking the above list to a PPTQ today.
At the moment I view opt to Jeskai as Thoughtscour is for Grixis.
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
UWR Control
BR Hollow One
Ended up missing pptq top 8. Went 4-2.
Below for detailed matches
Match One: Bant Eldrazi 2-1
Game 1 I am on the play. Get lucky and curve out perfectly. End up beating my opponent with two reality smashers on the field thanks to helix and Snapcasters.
Game 2: He has turn three Thoughtseer with cavern. I quickly get over run.
Game 3: spell queller wins me this game.
Match Two: Jund 1-2
Won a very Grindy game 1. Having 8 cantrips really helped steal this game.
In game 2, a combination of being mana screwed and being unable to deal with a turn 2 bob into lilli spelled doom for me.
Game 3 I mis-sideboarded. Kept in 3 spell queller instead of Geist. Flooded out and had him at 7 with s useless queller in my hand.
Match 3. Burn 1-2
Drew two helixss game 1, but didn't draw enough lands to hit snapcaster or pay off cards, ended up loosing. Won game 2 fairly easy. Game 3 was extremely close (got him down to 7 life). Came down to not drawing any helixes.
Match 4: Affinity. 2-0
Dominated this matchup.
Match 5: storm. 2-1.
Game 1 he had the turn 4 kill through counter magic. Game 2 he had empyty for 8 on turn 2, but I had bolt, path, and followed it up with Geist. Was able to race him. Game 3 I dominated with more control magic and removal.
Match 6: scape shift 2-0 (gave me win)
Got the pair down, guy gave me win. We played a few matches. If you have a turn 2 counter followed by a Geist (on play) that is how you win this matchup.
Overall 4-2. A few notes: I did get mana screwed considerably with only 22 lands. And I did have those awkward hands where I had three cantrips and only two lands...
That being said: I really liked opt and visions side by side. I might try adding a colonnade back and cutting one cantrip. (3 serum visions, 4 opts, 23 lands). Or just keep experimenting with the greedy build of only 22 lands.
Twitter: twitter.com/axmanonline
Stream: twitch.tv/axman
Current Decks
Modern: Affinity
Standard: BW Control
Legacy: Death and Taxes :symw::symr:
Vintage: NA
2 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
3 Celestial Colonnade
1 Tectonic Edge
1 Desolate Lighthouse
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Glacial Fortress
1 Sacred Foundry
2 Island
4 Arid Mesa
1 Mountain
1 Plains
4 Flooded Strand
3 Geist of Saint Traft
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Spell Queller
Spells 23
4 Path to Exile
3 Cryptic Command
2 Electrolyze
3 Lightning Helix
3 Logic Knot
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Serum Visions
Planeswalker 2
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Blessed Alliance
2 Rest in Peace
2 Detention Sphere
1 Anger of the Gods
2 Negate
2 Ceremonious Rejection
2 Stony Silence
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Ajani Vengeant
My 2 doubts are:
a) Chandra, I put it to function as a finisher, but I don't know if it's too janky
b) Opt x Serum, I prefer Serum for now, but are there any arguments for opt is this kind of deck?
Thanks a lot!
If you prefer a more flexible deck as far as being able to cast "what you want when want," Opt is better. If digging matters more, Serum Visions is for you. I think the jury is still out on which one this deck would want or the numbers on both if the deck ends up with both.
Opt has strong arguments for giving Jeskai the option to hold up mana for counters/quellers/burn. We also run a lot of 3-and-4-of's in our deck, many of which offer redundancy to the game plan. This could mean that the loss of a scry is less impactful for us than decks that may run many singletons or 2-ofs. In some sideboard games I can see Serum Visions being a lot better. I am testing with 4 opt / 2 Serum Visions.
Jeskai is not quite the right home for any of Chandra's +1 abilities. Her first ability often reveals a counter-spell, or tempts you to tap out in your own turn, which can open you up. Her second +1 is sorcery speed red mana, so not only can we not use it to play our counter-spells, but we have no double red in our deck unless you run Thundermaw Hellkite or Anger of the Gods. We also only run 6-12 red spells in the deck, so her ultimate may be less reliable than in mono-R or R/W prison.
I'm not saying her +1 abilities don't generate value for us in some way, but not optimally. Her -3 does technically defend herself though. I would agree that Ajani Vengeant is a better walker for the archetype. Depending on which part of the meta you want to target, some other cards that synergise well with a Jeskai game-plan and close games out are;
Vendilion Clique
Restoration Angel
Thundermaw Hellkite
Pia and Kiran Nalaar
Ajani Vengeant
Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
Torrential Gearhulk
------------
URW Jeskai Control
GUWRB Amulet Titan
GR Ponza
I'll take the Chandras out, maybe put 24 Opt / 2 Serum using these slots
As for the Arid Mesa, I don't have the Tarns yet, too pricey to pick up now, but in the enar future I'll put them in place of the Mesas