I can't speak for everyone as we all have different experiences (and different builds which is one of the things that makes the deck beautiful). But to answer your questions.
1.- I've won many games by a birds attacking with kessig. I have also won a lot of games by just trampling over blockers. I even have won games comboing where my opponent was at 20+ life and I couldnt fetch as streamlined as I wanted. It is an essential card and if I were forced to remove a land from my deck it would be gavony before kessig.
2.- Yes, it is super slow and it competes with a lot of three drops we are currently playing. I love the three drops we are playing and even some less-used options like Courser. If I wanted to look up for cards to add I would be searching for cmc-2 cards.
I am trying this deck tomorrow. A couple of questions:
1) are you all playing kessig, gq and tonwship main ? 3 coulorless lands seems pretty greedy to me... Can we cut kessig at all ?
2) Anyone has tried this with fauna shaman ? (for example luda ?) Fetching quellers one after each other seems like a pretty good way to stall games.
Many thanks.
I honestly haven't had many issues running 3 colorless sources. Kessig could be cut but I believe you lose a lot of reach.
I've played Fauna Shaman a ton and I know Kelvin Chew has tested it as well in the deck. I still bounce back and forth between the versions running it with singleton bullets main/expanded toolbox in the board and lists more focused around higher impact 2-ofs.
In a removal heavy Meta (Death's Shadow everywhere and decks trying to beat Death's Shadow everywhere) I prefer the more streamlined/less-toolboxy approach and allowing Spell Queller to act as a generic toolbox answer to problems I can't solve.
2-0 Grixis Control (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Negate, +2 Finks, +1 Bojuka Bog)
1-2 Grixis Control (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Negate, +2 Finks, +1 Bojuka Bog)
2-0 Abzan Midrange (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +1 Staticaster, +2 Reflector Mage) - It's possible Bojuka Bog is correct here vs. Flayer, Goyf & Souls?
2-0 Jeskai Control (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +1 Staticaster, +2 Negate) - Saw 2x Cliques G1, chose to bring in Staticaster as an easy answer to those & Snap.
2-0 RW Burn (board: -2 Retreat, -2 Spell Queller, +2 Finks, +2 Negate) - Without Blessed Alliance in the board, I feel like I'm boarded pretty light for this MU. Would probably bring in Reflector Mages on the play?
2-0 8 Rack (board: -2 Retreat, -1 Birds, +2 Negate, +1 Reclamation Sage, +1 Kataki, War's Wage)
0-2 Jund Midrange (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +3 Reflector Mage)
2-1 BUG Midrange (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +2 Reflector Mage, +1 Bojuka Bog)
2-0 GW Company (board: -1 Birds of Paradise, -2 Qasali Pridemage, +3 Reflector Mage)
2-1 UB Mill (board: -3 Voice of Resurgence, -2 Selfless Spirit, +2 Negate, +2 Unified Will +1 Reclamation Sage)
ID
I'm sure some of that is wrong, but I've been really happy with the 2 Tracker/2 Courser split in the main.
Like your list. Looks like mine, minus Trackers. I had 1 Eldritch Evo main and 1 Spellskite. Didn't feel good at all. Will change for trackers.
Any of you tried the Sejiri Steppe it's pretty good to protect combos or Queller removal. I queller'd a Supreme Verdict and on my turn as I declared attack phase, opponent plays Criptic on my queller to bounce it, tap knight, fetch Seijiri, protection from blue to my queller. It's the kind of play that makes me leaving it there. Main pain is that it comes into play tapped.
One more question: why are so many people on 0 witness ?
I've been running one, but I think most people have moved off of Witness and onto a split of Courser of Kruphix/Tireless Tracker for their grind engines. With sometimes 1-2 of those being replaced with Vendilion Clique, depending on expected matchups.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Playing UX Mana Denial until Modern gets the answers it needs.
WUBRG Humans BRW Mardu Pyromancer UW UW "Control" UR Blue Moon
I will never understand Eli Kassis lists, seriously. Only 3 path? 2 courser main and 2 courser sideboard? gideon main? And he has no social media, so unless someone knows him personally he can't explain this choices.
About meddling mage, don't forget the synergy with queller! Bolt the queller, in response collected company finding meddling mage naming whatever was under the queller prevents them casting it.
If someone goes with the meddling mages, I would encourage playing some number of vendilion cliques (for obvious reasons).
And it's really surprising to see so many knightfalls at team events. This deck plays stomping ground, which cuts them from death shadow jund. I know that there are other flavors for that deck, but I thought jund was the better version.
Neither list in the top 8 was running Stomping Ground if I remember correctly. The one list filled the slot with Sacred Foundry while the other cut red entirely.
I tried to talk to Eli at SCG Indy about the deck earlier this year and it kinda sounded like he just plays cards that he likes.. So I never really know what to take from his lists.
I will never understand Eli Kassis lists, seriously. Only 3 path? 2 courser main and 2 courser sideboard? gideon main? And he has no social media, so unless someone knows him personally he can't explain this choices.
About meddling mage, don't forget the synergy with queller! Bolt the queller, in response collected company finding meddling mage naming whatever was under the queller prevents them casting it.
If someone goes with the meddling mages, I would encourage playing some number of vendilion cliques (for obvious reasons).
And it's really surprising to see so many knightfalls at team events. This deck plays stomping ground, which cuts them from death shadow jund. I know that there are other flavors for that deck, but I thought jund was the better version.
The thing about Meddling Mage is that Eidolon of Rhetoric accomplishes a lot of the same things and a lot more. Granted it's 1 mana more, but it's more resilient to removal and more versatile. Eidolon of Rhetoric:
The thing about Meddling Mage is that Eidolon of Rhetoric accomplishes a lot of the same things and a lot more. Granted it's 1 mana more, but it's more resilient to removal and more versatile. Eidolon of Rhetoric:
@begle Spell Squeller, Path to Exile, Reflector Mage, and Izzet Staticaster kind of just owns elves entirely. I think you just need to change your list a bit and not keep hands with no interaction vs. decks that can just win without you interacting with them. Your MU vs. aggressive match-ups is weird sometimes but against decks like burn or zoo, things like Courser, Queller, Ooze, Path, counter spells, Reflector Mage, Blessed Alliance are just so good and slowing them down to the point where they're in top-deck mode and then you just auto-win.
The thing about Meddling Mage is that Eidolon of Rhetoric accomplishes a lot of the same things and a lot more. Granted it's 1 mana more, but it's more resilient to removal and more versatile. Eidolon of Rhetoric:
I agree that Eidolon of Rhetoric is just a far superior card than Meddling Mage across modern as a whole.
Shuts down Bring to Light
Actually has game vs. Burn/Revolt Zoo Decks
Cuts off Amulet Titan decks from Pact/Titan on the same turn
Slows Elves down a ton
Stops Grishoalbrand (most the time)
Stops Restore Balance
All good points as well, Luda. It really does stop a wide variety of unfair decks... Almost makes me want to play 2 in the Sideboard on top of an Eldritch Evolution, but sideboard space is so tight already...
Meddling Mage x 4 absolutely *****s on our worst match up, which is Tron variants
How so? At most you can shut off one of their pay-offs, but they play on average 3-4 different pay-off cards (Wurmcoil, Karn, Ugin, sometimes Ulamog/Worldbreaker/etc.) not to mention removal. We don't even play hand disruption, so are you planning to jam Meddling Mage and just guess which payoff card they have in hand? With Clique you could maybe do that, sure, but then you're dropping Meddling Mage on turn 4 at the earliest, and that's often too late, not to mention most lists run at most 1 Clique, maybe 2. Personally, I'd much rather get an early Knight out to Ghost Quarter their lands and have counterspells ready for when they drop their pay-off cards. I'm all for improving the Tron matchup, but I don't see how Meddling Mage is the answer.
Meddling Mage x 4 absolutely *****s on our worst match up, which is Tron variants
Clearly you've never played against living end, that is a worse matchup than tron. And the main reason I wanna play meddling mage.
The reason I want mage over eidolon is that mage is more useful in the matchups we need it, like tron, ad nauseam, and living end. Eidolon is great aginst control decks using snaps but remember eidolon restricts us too, meaning if we cast a spell and they counter it, we don't get another spell. Also, decks playing snap are already a very good matchup for us anyways. Also, hitting for two and coming down turn 2 instead of three is relevant since our curve is super packed on three already. Mage also has the potential to be good against random decks you may not expect to face where eidolon is a lot more restrictive in its ability to hate.
@deus837 Being a midrange deck, you're almost always disadvantaged but one of the things you can take advantage of is that you have many pieces that can prevent them from winning. @minun73 for example locked out a Tron player with JUST a Gaddock Teeg and a Stony Silence. Now imagine, an amalgamation of KotR + Ghost Quarter, Gaddock Teeg, Stony Silence, and Meddling Mage. I think people get to narrow when they think of sideboard cards, especially for Knightfall. The MU sucks bollocks, but you have many things that can work in conjunction with each other. With Meddling Mage, you just shutout their pay off spells out of your opponent ALONGSIDE all the possible means of interaction and denial the deck can offer. I found that one of the hardest things about trying to beat Tron is that our clock is rather slow and even if you counter one of their pay offs, they'll just find and play another, just as you posed. But the idea with Meddling Mage is that you shut out THAT SPECIFIC ENTIRE pay off, forcing them to either kill it, or find another pay-off. Again, you couple this with Gaddock Teeg and Stony Silence and you actually have a good shot at winning rather than praying Gaddock Teeg never dies and you have answers for Wurmcoil or their other bomb creatures. It also helps that Collected Company can be a competent answer at fetching out this hatebear rather than NEEDING to draw counterspells or you lose.
List:
1x Breeding Pool
2x Flooded Strand
3x Forest
1x Gavony Township
1x Ghost Quarter
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Horizon Canopy
1x Kessig Wolf Run
4x Misty Rainforest
1x Plains
1x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
4x Windswept Heath
3x Birds of Paradise
2x Courser of Kruphix
4x Knight of the Reliquary
4x Noble Hierarch
2x Qasali Pridemage
2x Scavenging Ooze
2x Selfless Spirit
4x Spell Queller
2x Tireless Tracker
3x Voice of Resurgence
Instant (8)
4x Collected Company
4x Path to Exile
Enchantment (2)
2x Retreat to Coralhelm
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Ghost Quarter
1x Izzet Staticaster
1x Kataki, War's Wage
2x Kitchen Finks
2x Negate
1x Reclamation Sage
3x Reflector Mage
1x Stony Silence
2x Unified Will
2-0 Grixis Control (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Negate, +2 Finks, +1 Bojuka Bog)
1-2 Grixis Control (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Negate, +2 Finks, +1 Bojuka Bog)
2-0 Abzan Midrange (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +1 Staticaster, +2 Reflector Mage) - It's possible Bojuka Bog is correct here vs. Flayer, Goyf & Souls?
2-0 Jeskai Control (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +1 Staticaster, +2 Negate) - Saw 2x Cliques G1, chose to bring in Staticaster as an easy answer to those & Snap.
2-0 RW Burn (board: -2 Retreat, -2 Spell Queller, +2 Finks, +2 Negate) - Without Blessed Alliance in the board, I feel like I'm boarded pretty light for this MU. Would probably bring in Reflector Mages on the play?
2-0 8 Rack (board: -2 Retreat, -1 Birds, +2 Negate, +1 Reclamation Sage, +1 Kataki, War's Wage)
0-2 Jund Midrange (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +3 Reflector Mage)
2-1 BUG Midrange (board: -2 Retreat, -3 Birds, +2 Finks, +2 Reflector Mage, +1 Bojuka Bog)
2-0 GW Company (board: -1 Birds of Paradise, -2 Qasali Pridemage, +3 Reflector Mage)
2-1 UB Mill (board: -3 Voice of Resurgence, -2 Selfless Spirit, +2 Negate, +2 Unified Will +1 Reclamation Sage)
ID
I'm sure some of that is wrong, but I've been really happy with the 2 Tracker/2 Courser split in the main.
I am trying this deck tomorrow. A couple of questions:
1) are you all playing kessig, gq and tonwship main ? 3 coulorless lands seems pretty greedy to me... Can we cut kessig at all ?
2) Anyone has tried this with fauna shaman ? (for example luda ?) Fetching quellers one after each other seems like a pretty good way to stall games.
Many thanks.
1.- I've won many games by a birds attacking with kessig. I have also won a lot of games by just trampling over blockers. I even have won games comboing where my opponent was at 20+ life and I couldnt fetch as streamlined as I wanted. It is an essential card and if I were forced to remove a land from my deck it would be gavony before kessig.
2.- Yes, it is super slow and it competes with a lot of three drops we are currently playing. I love the three drops we are playing and even some less-used options like Courser. If I wanted to look up for cards to add I would be searching for cmc-2 cards.
I honestly haven't had many issues running 3 colorless sources. Kessig could be cut but I believe you lose a lot of reach.
I've played Fauna Shaman a ton and I know Kelvin Chew has tested it as well in the deck. I still bounce back and forth between the versions running it with singleton bullets main/expanded toolbox in the board and lists more focused around higher impact 2-ofs.
Here's the last list w/ Shaman I have saved -
3x Birds of Paradise
4x Noble Hierarch
3x Fauna Shaman
1x Qasali Pridemage
2x Scavenging Ooze
1x Selfless Spirit
3x Voice of Resurgence
2x Courser of Kruphix
1x Eternal Witness
4x Knight of the Reliquary
4x Spell Queller
Spells (8)
4x Path to Exile
4x Collected Company
Enchantments (2)
2x Retreat to Coralhelm
1x Botanical Sanctum
1x Breeding Pool
1x Flooded Strand
3x Forest
1x Gavony Township
1x Ghost Quarter
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Horizon Canopy
1x Kessig Wolf Run
4x Misty Rainforest
1x Plains
1x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
4x Windswept Heath
2x Blessed Alliance
1x Kataki, War's Wage
1x Reclamation Sage
1x Gaddock Teeg
1x Aven Mindcensor
3x Unified Will
1x Eidolon of Rhetoric
1x Izzet Staticaster
2x Kitchen Finks
2x Reflector Mage
In a removal heavy Meta (Death's Shadow everywhere and decks trying to beat Death's Shadow everywhere) I prefer the more streamlined/less-toolboxy approach and allowing Spell Queller to act as a generic toolbox answer to problems I can't solve.
Like your list. Looks like mine, minus Trackers. I had 1 Eldritch Evo main and 1 Spellskite. Didn't feel good at all. Will change for trackers.
Any of you tried the Sejiri Steppe it's pretty good to protect combos or Queller removal. I queller'd a Supreme Verdict and on my turn as I declared attack phase, opponent plays Criptic on my queller to bounce it, tap knight, fetch Seijiri, protection from blue to my queller. It's the kind of play that makes me leaving it there. Main pain is that it comes into play tapped.
@Luda, I actually like both lists you posted. I will give a shot at the first tomorrow.
I've been running one, but I think most people have moved off of Witness and onto a split of Courser of Kruphix/Tireless Tracker for their grind engines. With sometimes 1-2 of those being replaced with Vendilion Clique, depending on expected matchups.
WUBRG Humans
BRW Mardu Pyromancer
UW UW "Control"
UR Blue Moon
About meddling mage, don't forget the synergy with queller! Bolt the queller, in response collected company finding meddling mage naming whatever was under the queller prevents them casting it.
If someone goes with the meddling mages, I would encourage playing some number of vendilion cliques (for obvious reasons).
And it's really surprising to see so many knightfalls at team events. This deck plays stomping ground, which cuts them from death shadow jund. I know that there are other flavors for that deck, but I thought jund was the better version.
L: Maverick
I tried to talk to Eli at SCG Indy about the deck earlier this year and it kinda sounded like he just plays cards that he likes.. So I never really know what to take from his lists.
The thing about Meddling Mage is that Eidolon of Rhetoric accomplishes a lot of the same things and a lot more. Granted it's 1 mana more, but it's more resilient to removal and more versatile. Eidolon of Rhetoric:
GWU Knightfall Spirit Company GWU
GWB Abzan Evolution GWB
I agree that Eidolon of Rhetoric is just a far superior card than Meddling Mage across modern as a whole.
All good points as well, Luda. It really does stop a wide variety of unfair decks... Almost makes me want to play 2 in the Sideboard on top of an Eldritch Evolution, but sideboard space is so tight already...
How so? At most you can shut off one of their pay-offs, but they play on average 3-4 different pay-off cards (Wurmcoil, Karn, Ugin, sometimes Ulamog/Worldbreaker/etc.) not to mention removal. We don't even play hand disruption, so are you planning to jam Meddling Mage and just guess which payoff card they have in hand? With Clique you could maybe do that, sure, but then you're dropping Meddling Mage on turn 4 at the earliest, and that's often too late, not to mention most lists run at most 1 Clique, maybe 2. Personally, I'd much rather get an early Knight out to Ghost Quarter their lands and have counterspells ready for when they drop their pay-off cards. I'm all for improving the Tron matchup, but I don't see how Meddling Mage is the answer.
GWU Knightfall Spirit Company GWU
GWB Abzan Evolution GWB
Clearly you've never played against living end, that is a worse matchup than tron. And the main reason I wanna play meddling mage.
The reason I want mage over eidolon is that mage is more useful in the matchups we need it, like tron, ad nauseam, and living end. Eidolon is great aginst control decks using snaps but remember eidolon restricts us too, meaning if we cast a spell and they counter it, we don't get another spell. Also, decks playing snap are already a very good matchup for us anyways. Also, hitting for two and coming down turn 2 instead of three is relevant since our curve is super packed on three already. Mage also has the potential to be good against random decks you may not expect to face where eidolon is a lot more restrictive in its ability to hate.
Almost definitely a sideboard card though