Vs affinity I would likely board out the smallpox. It comes down turn 2, only answers 1 creature which really isn't enough. Much of their mana comes from mana rocks so it isn't like hitting land will get you there. They usually drop multiple creatures so it won't ever hit what you want. What match ups are you struggling with boarding? Are you looking for different sideboard card options?
Vs affinity I would likely board out the smallpox. It comes down turn 2, only answers 1 creature which really isn't enough. Much of their mana comes from mana rocks so it isn't like hitting land will get you there. They usually drop multiple creatures so it won't ever hit what you want. What match ups are you struggling with boarding? Are you looking for different sideboard card options?
Good point on the smallpox.
An example from a recent match I played. I was playing against jeskai nahiri. Do I preemptively side in the Golgari Charms in game two expecting Rest In Peace? I did that match and they just sat in my hand all day doing nothing. I'm not even sure it's common for nahiri jeskai to play rest in peace anymore.
I'm rather happy with my sideboard. Do you ever find yourself boarding out lands/loams?
What decks, if any, should I side in Slaughter Games other than Scapeshift? Sorry if there are too many questions. Sideboarding has always been something I'm rather weak at and this is a niche enough deck that there definitely isn't any sideboarding guide anywhere.
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Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
In longer grindy games a few lands can be ok to side out like against Jund or Grixis control. Against decks running Rest in Peace you really want additional lands so you can draw into the last few points of damage with Assault and also have plenty of land to restart loam and dredging into more lands after you answer Rest in Peace.
I wouldn't board in charm vs jeskai nahiri expecting rest in peace. I believe some play a 1 of, but they want snapcaster to be live and they want to be able to discard emrakul to nahiri and shuffle it back in so they can search it up.
Slaughter games is great against Scapeshift, it is fine against Ad Nauseam and I also like it against UR storm. Take grapeshot and have sweepers for empty.
In longer grindy games a few lands can be ok to side out like against Jund or Grixis control. Against decks running Rest in Peace you really want additional lands so you can draw into the last few points of damage with Assault and also have plenty of land to restart loam and dredging into more lands after you answer Rest in Peace.
I wouldn't board in charm vs jeskai nahiri expecting rest in peace. I believe some play a 1 of, but they want snapcaster to be live and they want to be able to discard emrakul to nahiri and shuffle it back in so they can search it up.
Slaughter games is great against Scapeshift, it is fine against Ad Nauseam and I also like it against UR storm. Take grapeshot and have sweepers for empty.
Thanks!
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Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
Any thoughts on the recent spoiler from EMN Stunning Growth? 3G sorcery return all lands in the graveyard to the battlefield tapped.
Now, this kind of goes against the normal strategy of using lands as discard fuel for seismic assault/retrace cards but if any deck in modern can take advantage of it. I imagine it's this one. Maybe some sort of rampy shenanigans? I honestly don't know but it's an objectively powerful effect that just seems ready to be broken somehow.
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Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
I think it could be interesting if we wanted to run something like aggressive mining since it would be a good way to fight back against surgical extraction on loam. It also could be really cute with gitrog monster to make an insane value engine.
It's likely you would want countryside crusher for a build like that. Courser of Kruphix can end up being a life machine against burn and zoo if we can cast that and get 4 or 5 land back.
The finishing potential that's introduced by having him in play seems ridiculous. If you think about it; cast loam, three lands to hand, first seismic assault activation you trigger a draw, dredge three to get loam back and for any land you hit with the dredge you trigger another draw. After that you have loam back in your hand, two lands left, plus whatever extra draws you triggered from lands in the dredge.
Initial thoughts I have are that resolving him at five mana might be slow, but sliding him into an unburial rites suite is a no-brainer.
Just played against Skred Red and boy am I glad that's a fringe deck. Maindeck relic of progenitus. Maindeck sweepers to deal with young pyromancer+tokens. Maindeck blood moon and land destruction. Must be like 20-80 in their favor.
The finishing potential that's introduced by having him in play seems ridiculous. If you think about it; cast loam, three lands to hand, first seismic assault activation you trigger a draw, dredge three to get loam back and for any land you hit with the dredge you trigger another draw. After that you have loam back in your hand, two lands left, plus whatever extra draws you triggered from lands in the dredge.
Initial thoughts I have are that resolving him at five mana might be slow, but sliding him into an unburial rites suite is a no-brainer.
Feel free to test it. I have a feeling not a lot of people play loam shells anymore. Might be good
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Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
So, this is a version I put together after doing a lot of testing with the PyroPox loam I posted earlier. Here are some of the more pertinent changes I made and my reasoning.
Mainboard
-1 Ghost Quarter: Tron is a really good matchup atm since we can grind them out harder while before it was the opposite because of the inevitability of Eye of Ugin. An opening hang with Raven's Crime, lands, and a loam is nearly unbeatable for tron. I felt running a colorless land in a really color intensive shell was not worth it. It helps against affinity and infect to kill creature lands but those already tend to be fine matchups due to running so much removal in Smallpox/Bolts/Flame Jabs/Abrupt Decay. Even better postboard with the pyroclasms.
+4 Lingering Souls This card is just absurd in this shell. Procs Pyromancer, gives value off Commune with the Gods, I can discard it to Faithless Looting and not feel bad. Generally easy to splash since it allows 3 turns to grab white and the flashback cost is easy in an abundantly black deck. In addition, this card damn near makes the Jund matchup unloseable.(I already found I had a favorable matchup against jund with the jund shell.) As if Lili wasn't horrible enough against us. Rofl.
-3 Desperate Ravings, +3 Commune with the Gods: This is something I was discussing earlier in the thread. I found that desperate ravings was far too often a really bad dig spell. I found myself very rarely actually flashing back the spell(which is where most of the value is) In my experience, loam shells function very similarly to a combo deck in that you need to dig deep and find specific cards(in my case, lingering souls, seismic assault, loam, pyromancer) which serve as the main engine pieces/wincons. Lands serve as fuel to either dig or provide for said engine(Loam + Retrace for pyromancer or Loam + seismic assault). While most of the time Desperate Ravings hit something inconsequential like a land. My experience was that the card just drew into worthless stuff far too much. Sure, it's value since you're not discarding anything of worth most of the time. Sometimes you discard your only abrupt decay and you scoop to pure luck. These kinds of value cards just don't work that well in a deck that runs a lot of cards that rely on other cards. Another big reason, as I said before, was just that I very rarely had time to flashback desperate ravings. Discarding one of your three Seismic Assaults feels absolutely awful since it's one of the few cards in the deck that 1. tends to sit in your hand for a while 2. Is completely lost if it hits the yard. Splashing white also allows for more relevant sideboard cards as I'll go over in the next entry.
Sideboard
-2 Golgari Charm, +2 Ray of Revelation: This change was made with the white splash. Blood Moon is quite good against us. No doubt about it. However, Golgari Charm and Abrupt Decay being my only means of removing it was often extremely detrimental because it required two basics under a blood moon. Ray of Revelation either casting or flashing back requires only one basic which is infinitely easier to search out before the blood moon hits the table. I prefer this over similar cheap enchantment removal such as Nature's Claim or Natural State(both of which I considered) because Commune With the Gods and Faithless Looting both interact quite favorably with it. Commune by putting it in the yard and effectively drawing it. Faithless looting because it allows it to be cast for a different color if there's a blood moon on the field but you're lacking a basic forest. Just discard it with looting and you can use the plains you managed to get before the Moon hit the field. The other modes of Golgari Charm are honestly not terribly useful. In matchups where the -1, -1 is good I found myself overloaded with hate against decks which, as I said before, are already pretty decent matchups, namely Affinity and Infect. Against Affinity I would have literally 6 cards in the board for it(2 Ancient Grudge, 2 Pyroclasm, 2 Golgari Charm) and it was just overkill when Flame Jab means the matchup is quite good. For the regeneration effect I can't remember the last time I used it. It's basically only useful for protecting Pyromancer and that tends to not be my main wincon against decks that pack Anger of the Gods/Pyroclasm/Supreme Verdict anyway. Too often it was an enchantment removal that was hard to cast under a blood moon first and a mediocre instant board wipe second.
-2 Witchbane Orb +2 Bojuka, This more of a meta call in addition to balancing out the sideboard a bit. Burn as a whole has become pretty rare and even if it wasn't I don't feel dedicating 5 slots to it is worth it. Bojuka Bog is in response to the slurry of Dredge-flavored decks that come about(and this list's inability to effectively play Anger of the Gods). I also find myself boarding it in against Jund, Jeskai Nahiri, etc simply because I don't lose a whole lot from playing it. Oddly enough, now that I have a white splash I could feasibly play Leyline at this point but I don't find that effect all that worth it when Dragon's Claws generate so much life with Flame Jab spamming.(not to mention double white is difficult in a deck with 3 total white sources and a need for massive amounts of black and red mana for spamming retrace/seismic assault/smallpox.
More general bits I've learned in testing is that dedicating too hard to the Seismic Assault+Loam combo leaves you very vulnerable in a number of ways(leyline, enchantment hate, surgical extraction, etc) My list can attack from a lot of different angles and is quite resilient. Even something like Rest In Peace is beatable by playing a abusing Pyromancer.(Blood Moon does tend to still be a pain though).
Another thing is that Commune with the Gods is great even if you're only running 7 things it can hit like me. Even if it misses it puts Retrace cards in the yard, flashback stuff out of the board, lands for loam, mill a Lingering Souls, proc Pyromancer, etc. You can even discard to Faithless Looting if it's really that bad in a given scenario.
Cutting Liliana as one poster suggested before has really helped. I haven't really found myself wishing I had liliana. My turn 3 plays are absolutely filled to the brim atm(Lingering Souls, Loam+Retrace, Pyro+1cmc spell, Flashback Lingering Souls+1 cmc spell, Seimic Assault, etc) and I've found those types of plays to be far more impactful than Lili. The sac effect also tended to be redundant since I had Smallpox.(for hexproof and such)
That post ended up being much longer than I intended. Anyway, I don't expect a reply to every single point I bring up. I suppose my main question is this:
TLDR: How's the manabase? I tend to not be too good at making these kinds of things. It's felt fairly good but outside opinions always good. Any other general thoughts/advice are also appreciated.
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Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
The loss of Eye of Ugin is not what made our Tron match up better. Ghost quarter every turn means they can never assemble tron and that is why the match up is good. When they miss land drops it also gives you the opportunity to play a young pyromancer and get a retrace in every turn to get the value and close out the game while you lock them under ghost quarter. On the play you could potentially tap out turn 2 for pyro and then turn 3 begin ghost quarter lock, on the draw you just have to immediately begin ghost quarter as soon as possible. If you give them turn 3 to potentially have Tron and play something like a Karn, you're in trouble.
Lingering Souls is a very nice addition. I had considered it at one point, but always felt that 3 color was painful enough so I never wanted to add the 4th color. Glad to hear it has worked out for you.
Commune with the Gods was great when I ran it back in the Treasure Cruise era. I can imagine that would still hold true today, given that we always want to find the assault or pyro digging 5 cards is great.
Your sideboard changes seem perfectly reasonable. I am curious about Gutteral Response though. Is it necessary? Raven's crime should be handling Blue instants.
I believe it was I that suggested cutting Liliana. In that shell I was never happy to see her since she doesn't trigger pyromancer and using 2 spells like a raven's crime and bolt/jab/loam/etc after pyromancer always seemed better.
I always have Maelstrom Pulse for the Leyline of the Void/Leyline of Sanctity. It is also relevant that if your opponent taps out turn 4 for Nahiri, you can just pulse it away.
For your mana base I would drop Temple Garden and keep the Sacred Foundry and Godless Shrine for the white splash. We are predominantly RBgx deck. Which is why I would drop the GW producing land over the RW or BW. Also Temple garden doesn't pump into Graven Cairns whereas the other 2 can. I would definitely add a Ghost Quarter back to the main. You really don't want to have 0 ways of interacting with Trons mana base game 1. Smallpox is great and all, but not nearly effective enough to shut down Tron.
The loss of Eye of Ugin is not what made our Tron match up better. Ghost quarter every turn means they can never assemble tron and that is why the match up is good. When they miss land drops it also gives you the opportunity to play a young pyromancer and get a retrace in every turn to get the value and close out the game while you lock them under ghost quarter. On the play you could potentially tap out turn 2 for pyro and then turn 3 begin ghost quarter lock, on the draw you just have to immediately begin ghost quarter as soon as possible. If you give them turn 3 to potentially have Tron and play something like a Karn, you're in trouble.
Lingering Souls is a very nice addition. I had considered it at one point, but always felt that 3 color was painful enough so I never wanted to add the 4th color. Glad to hear it has worked out for you.
Commune with the Gods was great when I ran it back in the Treasure Cruise era. I can imagine that would still hold true today, given that we always want to find the assault or pyro digging 5 cards is great.
Your sideboard changes seem perfectly reasonable. I am curious about Gutteral Response though. Is it necessary? Raven's crime should be handling Blue instants.
I believe it was I that suggested cutting Liliana. In that shell I was never happy to see her since she doesn't trigger pyromancer and using 2 spells like a raven's crime and bolt/jab/loam/etc after pyromancer always seemed better.
I always have Maelstrom Pulse for the Leyline of the Void/Leyline of Sanctity. It is also relevant that if your opponent taps out turn 4 for Nahiri, you can just pulse it away.
For your mana base I would drop Temple Garden and keep the Sacred Foundry and Godless Shrine for the white splash. We are predominantly RBgx deck. Which is why I would drop the GW producing land over the RW or BW. Also Temple garden doesn't pump into Graven Cairns whereas the other 2 can. I would definitely add a Ghost Quarter back to the main. You really don't want to have 0 ways of interacting with Trons mana base game 1. Smallpox is great and all, but not nearly effective enough to shut down Tron.
Thanks for the manabase advice. As I said, I tend to be pretty bad at that aspect. I'll replace the Temple Garden with a GQ. After realizing how bad a GW land is, dropping it for a colorless land that helps against certain matchups doesn't sound bad.
On Guttural Response, I will admit, I have not tested a whole lot against Jeskai Nahiri. I've only played a handful of times against it.(in which Guttural response, as one might aspect did work but wasn't game-breaking) Guttural Response was basically the most obvious card that came to my head when I decided to add some sideboard against the deck. Good points about Maelstrom Pulse. I might just straight replace the Guttural Reponses with Pulse and then side out the abrupt decays for them against nahiri.
Another note about Lingering Souls. It's pretty amazing against jeskai nahiri as well since they have few ways of clearing them out that doesn't involve Anger of the Gods.(which would often be a dead card against us since we can go the entire game without having a creature on the field theoretically AND lingering souls is innately strong against board wipes by being split in two halves.) Not all nahiri lists include Staticaster in the board, and even then it's always a 1 of.
What are your thoughts on Dreadbore over Maelstrom Pulse in the board? Or do you think I should be mainboarding some number of Pulses? Dreadbore would be better for specifically the Nahiri matchup(or maybe not? It gets hit by spell snare) while maelstrom pulse in the board is a lot more general and applicable to tons of random T2 or T3 decks. I can't remember the last time I had someone play a Leyline of the Void against me and Leyline of Sanctity has become pretty rare with burn getting worse. Not to mention winning through a white leyline is perfectly reasonable with lingering souls/pyromancer.
Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
I don't think I would side out abrupt decay for the fact that it does still kill Clique, Snapcaster Mage, Soulfire Grandmaster, Rest in Peace and the stray pithing needle, etc.
I still prefer pulse since it does hit leyline which can be an issue. Bolt will likely never come out against you since it will always have some relevance so you can't always assume that pyromancer and souls will get there. Souls is likely to be ok, but being such a slow clock has a lot of disadvantages. Having pulse to turn assault and raven's crime back on is usually relevant. Plus the fact that it can hit every nonland with the same name could be relevant when staring down 2 or 3 tarmogoyf. The fact that dreadbore is a target for spell snare is also relevant, however dreadbore could open up the way for a pyromancer to land. I am not sure that is relevant enough though.
I don't think I would side out abrupt decay for the fact that it does still kill Clique, Snapcaster Mage, Soulfire Grandmaster, Rest in Peace and the stray pithing needle, etc.
I still prefer pulse since it does hit leyline which can be an issue. Bolt will likely never come out against you since it will always have some relevance so you can't always assume that pyromancer and souls will get there. Souls is likely to be ok, but being such a slow clock has a lot of disadvantages. Having pulse to turn assault and raven's crime back on is usually relevant. Plus the fact that it can hit every nonland with the same name could be relevant when staring down 2 or 3 tarmogoyf. The fact that dreadbore is a target for spell snare is also relevant, however dreadbore could open up the way for a pyromancer to land. I am not sure that is relevant enough though.
What do you recommend I cut for pulse then?
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Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
Hey, everyone. I've been tinkering with this deck a lot lately, and I've got some stuff to report back. For starters, I'll be playing a lot with the new cards this weekend, so here are some initial impressions:
-Noose Constrictor solves a lot of problems neatly for this deck: it's an aggressive threat that lets you leverage your engine, it defends against annoyances like Inkmoth Nexus and Lingering Souls, and it's a free discard outlet for dredge enabling and Gitrog shenanigans. It's tough that this competes with Goyf, but I think this might have the stuff.
-Grim Flayer is a funky little 2-drop. One hit is all it takes to shape the coming draw steps in your favor, but it plays poor defense, is significantly harder to grow than Goyf, and also competes for the same slot. This one's got some proving to do.
-Geier Reach Sanitarium strikes me as a very useful 1-of; Desolate Lighthouse was always a compelling reason to go RUG, and herein we have a version that costs less and can be played in any edition of the deck.
-Haunted Dead strikes me as a bit situational, but there's a certain appeal to these self-reanimators in a Loam deck, and this is clearly the best of the bunch. I think it really needs a sac outlet to really shine as a Zombie Infestation of sorts; Perhaps someone with more vision than I can make the pieces fit just right.
-Nahiri's Wrath is something altogether new to Modern: a Firestorm variant. These cards have been historically powerful in this type of deck, but needing to discard an action piece is a bit unfortunate, as is the lack of damage to the face. Perhaps it's most interesting as a sideboard piece to help combat weenie rushes or decks that attempt to go wide, but Anger might just be more efficient on that front.
-Bedlam Reveler is a complicated card that probably deserves a build all to itself. It doesn't seem all that unreasonable to enable, and the payoff is potentially humongous, but it might just rot in your hand and pigeonhole your deck into a build vulnerable to hate. The upside is there, and it will absolutely get tested.
-Collective Brutality seems priced to move and plays very nicely with Loam, but I have my reservations. Are these effects your deck is really wanting for? How situational are the abilities? Is it efficient enough to compete in such a tightly tuned list? I'll be testing this, but I have my reservations.
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On how the Shadows over Innistrad cards have been performing:
-The Gitrog Monster is one hell of a scary card, and a very potent addition to the list. The combo with Dakmor Salvage and Seismic Assault is the KO punch that this deck really needed to close out the game in certain matchups; I've frequently won with Path to Exile on the stack. Even as a pure value play this allows your deck to do some absolutely degenerate things that can grant you ludicrous amounts of card advantage. That said, it's a 5-drop, and you can't go lean too heavily on them in a rather ruthless modern meta. That's why you run...
-Traverse the Ulvenwald is a really interesting addition that I'm surprised more lists haven't picked up on. Enabling Delirium isn't as much of an afterthought as you might think, but once turned on this fetches most pieces of the Gitrog combo, important situational bullets, fixing, or simply an efficient threat. And even if you can't turn it on, this still cycles for a land, and we all know how well this deck makes use of lands. It's one of my favorite new additions.
-Nahiri, the Harbinger has seemed really strong for anyone running white. I'm convinced there's a strong Naya list out there running her, Knight, Flagstones, and other goodies.
-Groundskeeper was a really low-key reprint that I think didn't get enough attention. The basic land restriction is a killer in most decks, but in more all-in RG builds it's been a really interesting option to have available as Loams 5-8. EDIT: Forgot that 9th Edition made this legal before. It's still a card that I think was easily overlooked before but deserves re-evaluation.
-Drownyard Temple ran into the Splendid Reclamation problem of this not being a ramp deck at heart. You just have so much more to do with your mana in your deck and no good ways to abuse this yet.
-Sin Prodder was highly unimpressive. This deck's curve is quite low and while milling 1 every upkeep was useful, it's just too fragile to really make a name for itself.
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On the new additions to the metagame:
-Jeskai Nahiri is a tough nut to crack. It's really hard to stick an Assault effect against them, so you'll have to rely on your Loam engine and efficient threats. Keeping up the pressure is critical, because if they land Nahiri uncontested you're going to have a very hard time getting back in the game. Versions with Geist of St Traft pose even more of a problem.
-Bant Eldrazi feels like a slightly favorable matchup. If you can prevent them from getting too far out in front of you, your disruption lines up well against what they're trying to do.
-Dredge is a pain, there's no sugarcoating it. Not only are their threats super resilient, by proxy they've increased the playability of grave hate. Traverse lists can run Scooze and Kalitas to combat them, but be sure to sideboard some hate if you're expecting this to be a reasonable meta share.
-Scapeshift-less Valakut is certainly still a bad matchup, but losing the control element means you have a fighting chance. Be sure to leverage your Ghost Quarters effectively.
Hey, everyone. I've been tinkering with this deck a lot lately, and I've got some stuff to report back. For starters, I'll be playing a lot with the new cards this weekend, so here are some initial impressions:
I'm posting from mobile, I'll have to return to this later with responses to each item.
Splended reclamation I think could be great tech to at least get some value post board if life from the loam gets stripped from your deck. At least you can return all lands to get creature lands online in multiples possibly. It's worth it post board at least if you know surgical is a possibility. I like the idea of making a build with aggressive mining and reclamation. There is the possibility of adding amulet of vigor to gain "infinite" dig through your deck using assault as a way to kill. It could be really neat. Not sure if it would be a viable build though.
Noose Constrictor - I'm not sure we actually need this really for any reason. We're removal heavy and if the issue is resolving a spell, then this isn't going to help very much since we have access to decay, lighting bolt and later Seismic Assault. My experience is that infect is a favorable match up so I'm not sure this is necessary. In my experience I want to discard lands to cards like raven's crime retrace, assault and using faithless looting.
Geier Reach Sanitarium is likely fine as a one of for us to dig with, save a loam at instant speed. Running multiple ghost quarters we would need to be careful in not watering down the mana base since we have a very greedy array of spells to cast already.
Haunted Dead - I'm not convinced that this card really does much of what we want. It is likely better than zombie infestation since it brings along a spirit, but we don't have a reliable way to turn after turn use this ability.
Nahiri's Wrath- as you suggested anger of the Gods is likely just better. The fact it hits planeswalkers could be relevant, but the fact that it deals damage based on cmc is bad. I would rather it deal damage like devastating dreams which is a more relevant discard use since we can pitch lands. If you wanted to go Naya with nahiri and reckoner then pitching emrakul to 15 the reckoned and hitting face with that, then we are talking. As is anger exiling creatures is more relevant especially for dredge which you feel is a bad match up.
Bedlam reveler- I really like this as it discount without delve which is relevant. It allows us to draw extra cards and works well in a Pyromancer version with extra flame jabs and raven's crimes to get a lot of value from retrace spells.
Collective brutality is likely great with loam. Being able to kill eidolon, Goblin guide and also drain them for 2 then gain life is decent.
The Gitrog Monster/Traverse seems very good. Later in the game Traverse can grab a dakmor salvage for the combo finish. I like these as possibilities.
I went 4-0 at my store's weekly Modern event earlier today. Here's a report:
Match 1- Beat Grishoalbrand (2-1)
I got turn 2'ed in game 1. C'est la vie. Game 2 he mulligans and a pair of Thoughtseizes pick his hand apart. Game 3 I'm able to deploy a bunch of cheap threats, and by the time he's able to Breach in a Griselbrand I have a Terminate at the ready, and the one draw 7 he gets fizzles. The matchup's definitely not great, but targeted discard helps a ton and their deck often just loses to itself.
Match 2- Beat Death's Shadow Zoo (2-0)
Arguably the easiest matchup in the entire format for this deck. In game 1 my hand's a bit clunky, but I loot into Vortex/Loam and burn him for 8 on turn 4 when he attempts to go for a TBR kill. Game 2 he's able to Surgical my Loams but gets stuck on land and ultimately sided into too many hate cards. Eventually I just beat him to death with a Goyf.
Match 3- Beat UW Control (2-0)
Opponent is on a pretty stock list; I've struggled against similar builds in the past. Game 1 my opponent is on the play and basically has it all: turn 2 Jace, path for my Bob, Ojutai's Command to get back a Jace I killed and counter a Pyromancer, followed by a Cryptic on Bedlam Reveler bouncing my Assault. I also make a pretty big misplay by getting overzealous with my Bolt and letting Jace flip to counter it. Somehow though I'm able to resolve Assault again and he can't get it back off the table. My opponent draws a bunch of gas and starts to clock me with a Gideon Jura but runs out of countermagic, and I'm able to 16 him out of nowhere on the last possible turn. Shocked I won that one. Game 2 he wastes his countermagic on my Needle for Jace, and I curve out with a bunch of Jund-y threats that he can't keep contained.
Match 4- Beat Elves (2-1)
Game 1 my opponent is on the play but stuck on 1 land for a while while I pulverize his dorks with Vortex, but he manages to piece together some Dwynen's Elite beats into a hardcast Rec Sage, then follows up with an incredibly good CoCo into double Shaman, followed by Chord for Shaman to kill me. Tough beats. Game 2 he fights hard to disrupt my engine with Sage-Sage-Extract Flame Jab, but I'm able to contain the board while he floods a bit and I beat him to death with a Goyf. Game 3 I clear out his early Elves with an Anger, but he Extacts my Loams and he's able to tax my removal and halt my Pyromancer/Ravine beats. I then proceed to topdeck Bedlam Reveler, draw 3 lands with an Assault in play, and clear out his board.
As for the new cards, Bedlam Reveler felt great, and I might experiment with cutting Kalitas for another one in the future. There are definitely situations where you want to Traverse this up instead of Gitrog. Collective Brutality played well enough as a charm of sorts, though it definitely doesn't feel like an essential addition. I was only able to activate Geier Reach Sanitarium once, but I definitely found situations where having access to it would have been useful.
Traverse actually never occurred to me.(Which is odd considering I love the card) Definitely something to keep in mind for the builds that run a decent amount of creatures to enable it. I run a PyroPox variant splashing white for Lingering Souls(meaning the only creatures are 4 Pyromancers) so I'm going to try it as a 1-of to try and increase the density of Pyromancers somewhat in the lategame. Geier Reach Sanitarium is definitely something we want. Again, specifically for my build, I was skeptical about running a 1-of Ghost Quarter so I don't think I want another colorless land.
So, I was discussing having Guttural Response in the sideboard and I was reminded of another matchup where the card is a godsend. I played against RUG scapeshift. Now that's a deck where I really need the guttural responses to force through something and(this feels like a recurring theme) if I don't draw a Raven's Crime then I just lose.
Private Mod Note
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Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
If you can cast a spell, you're doing well, If you can't, that's okay, too. It usually takes a few turns before you have enough mana to do anything. Meanwhile, you should figure out whether you need to discard (p.11). Then announce the end of your turn, and let your opponent have a go.
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Good point on the smallpox.
An example from a recent match I played. I was playing against jeskai nahiri. Do I preemptively side in the Golgari Charms in game two expecting Rest In Peace? I did that match and they just sat in my hand all day doing nothing. I'm not even sure it's common for nahiri jeskai to play rest in peace anymore.
I'm rather happy with my sideboard. Do you ever find yourself boarding out lands/loams?
What decks, if any, should I side in Slaughter Games other than Scapeshift? Sorry if there are too many questions. Sideboarding has always been something I'm rather weak at and this is a niche enough deck that there definitely isn't any sideboarding guide anywhere.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
I wouldn't board in charm vs jeskai nahiri expecting rest in peace. I believe some play a 1 of, but they want snapcaster to be live and they want to be able to discard emrakul to nahiri and shuffle it back in so they can search it up.
Slaughter games is great against Scapeshift, it is fine against Ad Nauseam and I also like it against UR storm. Take grapeshot and have sweepers for empty.
Thanks!
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
Now, this kind of goes against the normal strategy of using lands as discard fuel for seismic assault/retrace cards but if any deck in modern can take advantage of it. I imagine it's this one. Maybe some sort of rampy shenanigans? I honestly don't know but it's an objectively powerful effect that just seems ready to be broken somehow.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
It's likely you would want countryside crusher for a build like that. Courser of Kruphix can end up being a life machine against burn and zoo if we can cast that and get 4 or 5 land back.
The finishing potential that's introduced by having him in play seems ridiculous. If you think about it; cast loam, three lands to hand, first seismic assault activation you trigger a draw, dredge three to get loam back and for any land you hit with the dredge you trigger another draw. After that you have loam back in your hand, two lands left, plus whatever extra draws you triggered from lands in the dredge.
Initial thoughts I have are that resolving him at five mana might be slow, but sliding him into an unburial rites suite is a no-brainer.
Feel free to test it. I have a feeling not a lot of people play loam shells anymore. Might be good
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Raging Ravine
1 Forest
3 Graven Cairns
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Urborb, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Stomping Ground
1 Plains
4 Marsh Flats
1 Temple Garden
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Blood Crypt
4 Blackcleave Cliffs
1 Godless Shrine
1 Temple Garden
3 Commune with the Gods
4 Lingering Souls
2 Raven's Crime
2 Flame Jab
4 Faithless Looting
4 Life from the Loam
3 Smallpox
4 Creatures
4 Young Pyromancer
3 Lightning Bolt
2 Abrupt Decay
3 Enchantments
3 Seismic Assault
Board
So, this is a version I put together after doing a lot of testing with the PyroPox loam I posted earlier. Here are some of the more pertinent changes I made and my reasoning.
Mainboard
-1 Ghost Quarter: Tron is a really good matchup atm since we can grind them out harder while before it was the opposite because of the inevitability of Eye of Ugin. An opening hang with Raven's Crime, lands, and a loam is nearly unbeatable for tron. I felt running a colorless land in a really color intensive shell was not worth it. It helps against affinity and infect to kill creature lands but those already tend to be fine matchups due to running so much removal in Smallpox/Bolts/Flame Jabs/Abrupt Decay. Even better postboard with the pyroclasms.
+4 Lingering Souls This card is just absurd in this shell. Procs Pyromancer, gives value off Commune with the Gods, I can discard it to Faithless Looting and not feel bad. Generally easy to splash since it allows 3 turns to grab white and the flashback cost is easy in an abundantly black deck. In addition, this card damn near makes the Jund matchup unloseable.(I already found I had a favorable matchup against jund with the jund shell.) As if Lili wasn't horrible enough against us. Rofl.
-3 Desperate Ravings, +3 Commune with the Gods: This is something I was discussing earlier in the thread. I found that desperate ravings was far too often a really bad dig spell. I found myself very rarely actually flashing back the spell(which is where most of the value is) In my experience, loam shells function very similarly to a combo deck in that you need to dig deep and find specific cards(in my case, lingering souls, seismic assault, loam, pyromancer) which serve as the main engine pieces/wincons. Lands serve as fuel to either dig or provide for said engine(Loam + Retrace for pyromancer or Loam + seismic assault). While most of the time Desperate Ravings hit something inconsequential like a land. My experience was that the card just drew into worthless stuff far too much. Sure, it's value since you're not discarding anything of worth most of the time. Sometimes you discard your only abrupt decay and you scoop to pure luck. These kinds of value cards just don't work that well in a deck that runs a lot of cards that rely on other cards. Another big reason, as I said before, was just that I very rarely had time to flashback desperate ravings. Discarding one of your three Seismic Assaults feels absolutely awful since it's one of the few cards in the deck that 1. tends to sit in your hand for a while 2. Is completely lost if it hits the yard. Splashing white also allows for more relevant sideboard cards as I'll go over in the next entry.
Sideboard
-2 Golgari Charm, +2 Ray of Revelation: This change was made with the white splash. Blood Moon is quite good against us. No doubt about it. However, Golgari Charm and Abrupt Decay being my only means of removing it was often extremely detrimental because it required two basics under a blood moon. Ray of Revelation either casting or flashing back requires only one basic which is infinitely easier to search out before the blood moon hits the table. I prefer this over similar cheap enchantment removal such as Nature's Claim or Natural State(both of which I considered) because Commune With the Gods and Faithless Looting both interact quite favorably with it. Commune by putting it in the yard and effectively drawing it. Faithless looting because it allows it to be cast for a different color if there's a blood moon on the field but you're lacking a basic forest. Just discard it with looting and you can use the plains you managed to get before the Moon hit the field. The other modes of Golgari Charm are honestly not terribly useful. In matchups where the -1, -1 is good I found myself overloaded with hate against decks which, as I said before, are already pretty decent matchups, namely Affinity and Infect. Against Affinity I would have literally 6 cards in the board for it(2 Ancient Grudge, 2 Pyroclasm, 2 Golgari Charm) and it was just overkill when Flame Jab means the matchup is quite good. For the regeneration effect I can't remember the last time I used it. It's basically only useful for protecting Pyromancer and that tends to not be my main wincon against decks that pack Anger of the Gods/Pyroclasm/Supreme Verdict anyway. Too often it was an enchantment removal that was hard to cast under a blood moon first and a mediocre instant board wipe second.
-2 Witchbane Orb +2 Bojuka, This more of a meta call in addition to balancing out the sideboard a bit. Burn as a whole has become pretty rare and even if it wasn't I don't feel dedicating 5 slots to it is worth it. Bojuka Bog is in response to the slurry of Dredge-flavored decks that come about(and this list's inability to effectively play Anger of the Gods). I also find myself boarding it in against Jund, Jeskai Nahiri, etc simply because I don't lose a whole lot from playing it. Oddly enough, now that I have a white splash I could feasibly play Leyline at this point but I don't find that effect all that worth it when Dragon's Claws generate so much life with Flame Jab spamming.(not to mention double white is difficult in a deck with 3 total white sources and a need for massive amounts of black and red mana for spamming retrace/seismic assault/smallpox.
More general bits I've learned in testing is that dedicating too hard to the Seismic Assault+Loam combo leaves you very vulnerable in a number of ways(leyline, enchantment hate, surgical extraction, etc) My list can attack from a lot of different angles and is quite resilient. Even something like Rest In Peace is beatable by playing a abusing Pyromancer.(Blood Moon does tend to still be a pain though).
Another thing is that Commune with the Gods is great even if you're only running 7 things it can hit like me. Even if it misses it puts Retrace cards in the yard, flashback stuff out of the board, lands for loam, mill a Lingering Souls, proc Pyromancer, etc. You can even discard to Faithless Looting if it's really that bad in a given scenario.
Cutting Liliana as one poster suggested before has really helped. I haven't really found myself wishing I had liliana. My turn 3 plays are absolutely filled to the brim atm(Lingering Souls, Loam+Retrace, Pyro+1cmc spell, Flashback Lingering Souls+1 cmc spell, Seimic Assault, etc) and I've found those types of plays to be far more impactful than Lili. The sac effect also tended to be redundant since I had Smallpox.(for hexproof and such)
That post ended up being much longer than I intended. Anyway, I don't expect a reply to every single point I bring up. I suppose my main question is this:
TLDR: How's the manabase? I tend to not be too good at making these kinds of things. It's felt fairly good but outside opinions always good. Any other general thoughts/advice are also appreciated.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
Lingering Souls is a very nice addition. I had considered it at one point, but always felt that 3 color was painful enough so I never wanted to add the 4th color. Glad to hear it has worked out for you.
Commune with the Gods was great when I ran it back in the Treasure Cruise era. I can imagine that would still hold true today, given that we always want to find the assault or pyro digging 5 cards is great.
Your sideboard changes seem perfectly reasonable. I am curious about Gutteral Response though. Is it necessary? Raven's crime should be handling Blue instants.
I believe it was I that suggested cutting Liliana. In that shell I was never happy to see her since she doesn't trigger pyromancer and using 2 spells like a raven's crime and bolt/jab/loam/etc after pyromancer always seemed better.
I always have Maelstrom Pulse for the Leyline of the Void/Leyline of Sanctity. It is also relevant that if your opponent taps out turn 4 for Nahiri, you can just pulse it away.
For your mana base I would drop Temple Garden and keep the Sacred Foundry and Godless Shrine for the white splash. We are predominantly RBgx deck. Which is why I would drop the GW producing land over the RW or BW. Also Temple garden doesn't pump into Graven Cairns whereas the other 2 can. I would definitely add a Ghost Quarter back to the main. You really don't want to have 0 ways of interacting with Trons mana base game 1. Smallpox is great and all, but not nearly effective enough to shut down Tron.
Thanks for the manabase advice. As I said, I tend to be pretty bad at that aspect. I'll replace the Temple Garden with a GQ. After realizing how bad a GW land is, dropping it for a colorless land that helps against certain matchups doesn't sound bad.
On Guttural Response, I will admit, I have not tested a whole lot against Jeskai Nahiri. I've only played a handful of times against it.(in which Guttural response, as one might aspect did work but wasn't game-breaking) Guttural Response was basically the most obvious card that came to my head when I decided to add some sideboard against the deck. Good points about Maelstrom Pulse. I might just straight replace the Guttural Reponses with Pulse and then side out the abrupt decays for them against nahiri.
Another note about Lingering Souls. It's pretty amazing against jeskai nahiri as well since they have few ways of clearing them out that doesn't involve Anger of the Gods.(which would often be a dead card against us since we can go the entire game without having a creature on the field theoretically AND lingering souls is innately strong against board wipes by being split in two halves.) Not all nahiri lists include Staticaster in the board, and even then it's always a 1 of.
What are your thoughts on Dreadbore over Maelstrom Pulse in the board? Or do you think I should be mainboarding some number of Pulses? Dreadbore would be better for specifically the Nahiri matchup(or maybe not? It gets hit by spell snare) while maelstrom pulse in the board is a lot more general and applicable to tons of random T2 or T3 decks. I can't remember the last time I had someone play a Leyline of the Void against me and Leyline of Sanctity has become pretty rare with burn getting worse. Not to mention winning through a white leyline is perfectly reasonable with lingering souls/pyromancer.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
I still prefer pulse since it does hit leyline which can be an issue. Bolt will likely never come out against you since it will always have some relevance so you can't always assume that pyromancer and souls will get there. Souls is likely to be ok, but being such a slow clock has a lot of disadvantages. Having pulse to turn assault and raven's crime back on is usually relevant. Plus the fact that it can hit every nonland with the same name could be relevant when staring down 2 or 3 tarmogoyf. The fact that dreadbore is a target for spell snare is also relevant, however dreadbore could open up the way for a pyromancer to land. I am not sure that is relevant enough though.
What do you recommend I cut for pulse then?
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.
-Splendid Reclamation is quite a different beast than anything we've seen so far in this deck. It plays a much more explosive game than we're used to and shouldn't be thought of as a Loam or Crucible variant. Valakut's a good starting point, but you can go to a lot of interesting places such as Meloku, the Clouded Mirror/Trade Routes, Kessig Wolf Run, Lotus Cobra, and Aggressive Mining.
-Noose Constrictor solves a lot of problems neatly for this deck: it's an aggressive threat that lets you leverage your engine, it defends against annoyances like Inkmoth Nexus and Lingering Souls, and it's a free discard outlet for dredge enabling and Gitrog shenanigans. It's tough that this competes with Goyf, but I think this might have the stuff.
-Grim Flayer is a funky little 2-drop. One hit is all it takes to shape the coming draw steps in your favor, but it plays poor defense, is significantly harder to grow than Goyf, and also competes for the same slot. This one's got some proving to do.
-Geier Reach Sanitarium strikes me as a very useful 1-of; Desolate Lighthouse was always a compelling reason to go RUG, and herein we have a version that costs less and can be played in any edition of the deck.
-Haunted Dead strikes me as a bit situational, but there's a certain appeal to these self-reanimators in a Loam deck, and this is clearly the best of the bunch. I think it really needs a sac outlet to really shine as a Zombie Infestation of sorts; Perhaps someone with more vision than I can make the pieces fit just right.
-Nahiri's Wrath is something altogether new to Modern: a Firestorm variant. These cards have been historically powerful in this type of deck, but needing to discard an action piece is a bit unfortunate, as is the lack of damage to the face. Perhaps it's most interesting as a sideboard piece to help combat weenie rushes or decks that attempt to go wide, but Anger might just be more efficient on that front.
-Bedlam Reveler is a complicated card that probably deserves a build all to itself. It doesn't seem all that unreasonable to enable, and the payoff is potentially humongous, but it might just rot in your hand and pigeonhole your deck into a build vulnerable to hate. The upside is there, and it will absolutely get tested.
-Collective Brutality seems priced to move and plays very nicely with Loam, but I have my reservations. Are these effects your deck is really wanting for? How situational are the abilities? Is it efficient enough to compete in such a tightly tuned list? I'll be testing this, but I have my reservations.
--------------
On how the Shadows over Innistrad cards have been performing:
-The Gitrog Monster is one hell of a scary card, and a very potent addition to the list. The combo with Dakmor Salvage and Seismic Assault is the KO punch that this deck really needed to close out the game in certain matchups; I've frequently won with Path to Exile on the stack. Even as a pure value play this allows your deck to do some absolutely degenerate things that can grant you ludicrous amounts of card advantage. That said, it's a 5-drop, and you can't go lean too heavily on them in a rather ruthless modern meta. That's why you run...
-Traverse the Ulvenwald is a really interesting addition that I'm surprised more lists haven't picked up on. Enabling Delirium isn't as much of an afterthought as you might think, but once turned on this fetches most pieces of the Gitrog combo, important situational bullets, fixing, or simply an efficient threat. And even if you can't turn it on, this still cycles for a land, and we all know how well this deck makes use of lands. It's one of my favorite new additions.
-Nahiri, the Harbinger has seemed really strong for anyone running white. I'm convinced there's a strong Naya list out there running her, Knight, Flagstones, and other goodies.
-Groundskeeper was a really low-key reprint that I think didn't get enough attention. The basic land restriction is a killer in most decks, but in more all-in RG builds it's been a really interesting option to have available as Loams 5-8. EDIT: Forgot that 9th Edition made this legal before. It's still a card that I think was easily overlooked before but deserves re-evaluation.
-Drownyard Temple ran into the Splendid Reclamation problem of this not being a ramp deck at heart. You just have so much more to do with your mana in your deck and no good ways to abuse this yet.
-Sin Prodder was highly unimpressive. This deck's curve is quite low and while milling 1 every upkeep was useful, it's just too fragile to really make a name for itself.
--------------
On the new additions to the metagame:
-Jeskai Nahiri is a tough nut to crack. It's really hard to stick an Assault effect against them, so you'll have to rely on your Loam engine and efficient threats. Keeping up the pressure is critical, because if they land Nahiri uncontested you're going to have a very hard time getting back in the game. Versions with Geist of St Traft pose even more of a problem.
-Bant Eldrazi feels like a slightly favorable matchup. If you can prevent them from getting too far out in front of you, your disruption lines up well against what they're trying to do.
-Dredge is a pain, there's no sugarcoating it. Not only are their threats super resilient, by proxy they've increased the playability of grave hate. Traverse lists can run Scooze and Kalitas to combat them, but be sure to sideboard some hate if you're expecting this to be a reasonable meta share.
-Scapeshift-less Valakut is certainly still a bad matchup, but losing the control element means you have a fighting chance. Be sure to leverage your Ghost Quarters effectively.
Cubetutor Link
I'm posting from mobile, I'll have to return to this later with responses to each item.
Splended reclamation I think could be great tech to at least get some value post board if life from the loam gets stripped from your deck. At least you can return all lands to get creature lands online in multiples possibly. It's worth it post board at least if you know surgical is a possibility. I like the idea of making a build with aggressive mining and reclamation. There is the possibility of adding amulet of vigor to gain "infinite" dig through your deck using assault as a way to kill. It could be really neat. Not sure if it would be a viable build though.
Noose Constrictor - I'm not sure we actually need this really for any reason. We're removal heavy and if the issue is resolving a spell, then this isn't going to help very much since we have access to decay, lighting bolt and later Seismic Assault. My experience is that infect is a favorable match up so I'm not sure this is necessary. In my experience I want to discard lands to cards like raven's crime retrace, assault and using faithless looting.
Geier Reach Sanitarium is likely fine as a one of for us to dig with, save a loam at instant speed. Running multiple ghost quarters we would need to be careful in not watering down the mana base since we have a very greedy array of spells to cast already.
Haunted Dead - I'm not convinced that this card really does much of what we want. It is likely better than zombie infestation since it brings along a spirit, but we don't have a reliable way to turn after turn use this ability.
Nahiri's Wrath- as you suggested anger of the Gods is likely just better. The fact it hits planeswalkers could be relevant, but the fact that it deals damage based on cmc is bad. I would rather it deal damage like devastating dreams which is a more relevant discard use since we can pitch lands. If you wanted to go Naya with nahiri and reckoner then pitching emrakul to 15 the reckoned and hitting face with that, then we are talking. As is anger exiling creatures is more relevant especially for dredge which you feel is a bad match up.
Bedlam reveler- I really like this as it discount without delve which is relevant. It allows us to draw extra cards and works well in a Pyromancer version with extra flame jabs and raven's crimes to get a lot of value from retrace spells.
Collective brutality is likely great with loam. Being able to kill eidolon, Goblin guide and also drain them for 2 then gain life is decent.
The Gitrog Monster/Traverse seems very good. Later in the game Traverse can grab a dakmor salvage for the combo finish. I like these as possibilities.
2x Blood Crypt
4x Bloodstained Mire
1x Copperline Gorge
1x Dakmor Salvage
1x Fire-Lit Thicket
1x Forest
1x Geier Reach Sanitarium
2x Ghost Quarter
1x Graven Cairns
2x Mountain
1x Overgrown Tomb
1x Raging Ravine
3x Stomping Ground
1x Swamp
4x Wooded Foothills
Sorcery (14)
1x Collective Brutality
4x Faithless Looting
1x Flame Jab
4x Life from the Loam
1x Magmatic Insight
1x Raven's Crime
2x Traverse the Ulvenwald
1x Bedlam Reveler
1x Dark Confidant
1x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Tarmogoyf
1x The Gitrog Monster
3x Young Pyromancer
Instant (6)
1x Abrupt Decay
4x Lightning Bolt
1x Terminate
Enchantment (5)
2x Molten Vortex
3x Seismic Assault
1x Abrupt Decay
3x Ancient Grudge
2x Anger of the Gods
1x Crucible of Worlds
2x Dragon's Claw
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Pithing Needle
1x Reclamation Sage
2x Thoughtseize
I went 4-0 at my store's weekly Modern event earlier today. Here's a report:
Match 1- Beat Grishoalbrand (2-1)
I got turn 2'ed in game 1. C'est la vie. Game 2 he mulligans and a pair of Thoughtseizes pick his hand apart. Game 3 I'm able to deploy a bunch of cheap threats, and by the time he's able to Breach in a Griselbrand I have a Terminate at the ready, and the one draw 7 he gets fizzles. The matchup's definitely not great, but targeted discard helps a ton and their deck often just loses to itself.
Match 2- Beat Death's Shadow Zoo (2-0)
Arguably the easiest matchup in the entire format for this deck. In game 1 my hand's a bit clunky, but I loot into Vortex/Loam and burn him for 8 on turn 4 when he attempts to go for a TBR kill. Game 2 he's able to Surgical my Loams but gets stuck on land and ultimately sided into too many hate cards. Eventually I just beat him to death with a Goyf.
Match 3- Beat UW Control (2-0)
Opponent is on a pretty stock list; I've struggled against similar builds in the past. Game 1 my opponent is on the play and basically has it all: turn 2 Jace, path for my Bob, Ojutai's Command to get back a Jace I killed and counter a Pyromancer, followed by a Cryptic on Bedlam Reveler bouncing my Assault. I also make a pretty big misplay by getting overzealous with my Bolt and letting Jace flip to counter it. Somehow though I'm able to resolve Assault again and he can't get it back off the table. My opponent draws a bunch of gas and starts to clock me with a Gideon Jura but runs out of countermagic, and I'm able to 16 him out of nowhere on the last possible turn. Shocked I won that one. Game 2 he wastes his countermagic on my Needle for Jace, and I curve out with a bunch of Jund-y threats that he can't keep contained.
Match 4- Beat Elves (2-1)
Game 1 my opponent is on the play but stuck on 1 land for a while while I pulverize his dorks with Vortex, but he manages to piece together some Dwynen's Elite beats into a hardcast Rec Sage, then follows up with an incredibly good CoCo into double Shaman, followed by Chord for Shaman to kill me. Tough beats. Game 2 he fights hard to disrupt my engine with Sage-Sage-Extract Flame Jab, but I'm able to contain the board while he floods a bit and I beat him to death with a Goyf. Game 3 I clear out his early Elves with an Anger, but he Extacts my Loams and he's able to tax my removal and halt my Pyromancer/Ravine beats. I then proceed to topdeck Bedlam Reveler, draw 3 lands with an Assault in play, and clear out his board.
As for the new cards, Bedlam Reveler felt great, and I might experiment with cutting Kalitas for another one in the future. There are definitely situations where you want to Traverse this up instead of Gitrog. Collective Brutality played well enough as a charm of sorts, though it definitely doesn't feel like an essential addition. I was only able to activate Geier Reach Sanitarium once, but I definitely found situations where having access to it would have been useful.
Cubetutor Link
So, I was discussing having Guttural Response in the sideboard and I was reminded of another matchup where the card is a godsend. I played against RUG scapeshift. Now that's a deck where I really need the guttural responses to force through something and(this feels like a recurring theme) if I don't draw a Raven's Crime then I just lose.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 19 years later.
Happy is the man who has broken the chains that hurt the mind and given up worrying once and for all. Be patient and tough. One day this pain will be useful to you.