Coming Saturday is a championship after last year's qualifications. 24 players will be competing for the title. Expected meta is BW Eldrazi Taxes, Bant Eldrazi, Burn, Infect, Grixis Control, Kiln Fiend, Merfolk and Midrange. The players competing have also been seen with Madcap, 5C Bring to Light, Tron, Skred, Affinity, Titan Breach and Ad Nauseam. Yes it can go all directions
I'm thinking about playing this list, could I get your guys' thoughts? Last times I tried Mind Stone I didn't like it so much. I'm taking a more discard approach rather than the ramp.
This is my first list post-Aether Revolt release. The sideboard is setup to help with tron, go-wide strategies, blood moon, and extra removal/discard. The main deck looks like it could maybe use Liliana, the Last Hope or maybe a revisit to Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet as some additional threats.
I don't think 23 lands with no mind stones is where you want to be, this deck has a very high mana curve and you're basically short two lands (I would count two mind stones as 1 land). If you get stuck on two lands and miss even 1 land drop you're in trouble.
I also think CoBr replaced the need for inquisition, inquisition is such a dead draw late game and 8 discard is a lot, I feel like you'll find yourself top decking it mid to late game too often.
Spitballing Ideas here, but maybe this (http://mythicspoiler.com/aer/cards/hiddenstocks.html) could help us smooth our draws. Since we have little card draw, maybe scrying is important. Might be a bad idea; not too sure. Making 1/1s and scrying every turn shouldnt be underestimated.
As an aside, I wonder if we can't afford to play more of a control deck with the inclusion of Fatal Push. Maybe we get to cut our Stranglers for Push, and Play Blight Herders in the Main as another haymaker, and a way to go over midrange and control. Our Aggro matchup will almost assuredly be better with this card, but I think we may find that we will be lacking on threats, especially because other decks with be playing Push as well. Herder not only dodges Push, but also makes a bunch of chump Blockers. In this way, our processors also don't compete for value. I think I may try this angle when Push is released, doing something like this:
-4 Strangler, -1 Anguished Unmaking(moved to the side)-1 Go For the Throat
+2 Blight Herder, +4 Fatal Push
Let me know what you think
I would not cut strangler. I would move one in the main with one or two in the side. strangler is another important control aspect in many forms for us, plus it makes relic all that much more worth it.
Spitballing Ideas here, but maybe this (http://mythicspoiler.com/aer/cards/hiddenstocks.html) could help us smooth our draws. Since we have little card draw, maybe scrying is important. Might be a bad idea; not too sure. Making 1/1s and scrying every turn shouldnt be underestimated.
As an aside, I wonder if we can't afford to play more of a control deck with the inclusion of Fatal Push. Maybe we get to cut our Stranglers for Push, and Play Blight Herders in the Main as another haymaker, and a way to go over midrange and control. Our Aggro matchup will almost assuredly be better with this card, but I think we may find that we will be lacking on threats, especially because other decks with be playing Push as well. Herder not only dodges Push, but also makes a bunch of chump Blockers. In this way, our processors also don't compete for value. I think I may try this angle when Push is released, doing something like this:
-4 Strangler, -1 Anguished Unmaking(moved to the side)-1 Go For the Throat
+2 Blight Herder, +4 Fatal Push
Let me know what you think
Fatal Push is gonna be real good, but I think the hype train is going off the rails a little on it. Fetches are a great way to turn it on, but they impose play restrictions if players are waiting to crack them in order to make their removal relevant. Especially because most decks want to get their fetching out of the way early in the match, rather than later, when the 3-4 drops land. So I don't think Strangler is too vulnerable to Push--after all, it dies to Bolt too, and it's still good against Red decks.
I think that in Processors we might want to go a little easy with how many Pushes we run. In our deck, we don't actually have room for a whole lot of fetch lands. We also may need to keep up a threat of a Relic crack, or we might not have the mana for both that and Push, or we might have a Souls in the yard, or have some other reason to not want to crack Relic just to kill Kalitas, Resto, Rhino, or what-have-you. It seems to me that the real strength of Push, for a deck that also runs White, is that it can kill the early drops without penalty. In fact, I wonder if dropping a Path for a Push might actually be the right play, to increase the likelihood of having the right early removal in our opener.
I 100% do not think that cutting Stranglers for Herders because Push is a thing is going to work out. Siding out Relics doesn't usually mean that Strangler gets nerfed too badly, because of the one-card requirement, and Relic is really irrelevant in matches against decks that don't use the graveyard for power. I side out all four Relics all the time for more relevant spells, but that would sure be harder to do with a move to Herder. One Path or one Seer can turn on Strangler's removal; Meanwhile, Herder is still sitting there waiting for gas. Nowadays, Relic is not in the deck because it powers Processing. Or at least, not primarily for that. It is here to hate on the many graveyard-reliant decks, and also to power Processing.
Coming Saturday is a championship after last year's qualifications. 24 players will be competing for the title. Expected meta is BW Eldrazi Taxes, Bant Eldrazi, Burn, Infect, Grixis Control, Kiln Fiend, Merfolk and Midrange. The players competing have also been seen with Madcap, 5C Bring to Light, Tron, Skred, Affinity, Titan Breach and Ad Nauseam. Yes it can go all directions
I'm thinking about playing this list, could I get your guys' thoughts? Last times I tried Mind Stone I didn't like it so much. I'm taking a more discard approach rather than the ramp.
I agree that 23 lands and no Mind Stones may be too greedy. Mind Stone really makes 2-land keeps workable, when they would otherwise be very risky in many cases. I think you should at least stay at 24 lands if you aren't running Stone. Stone is a big help against Blood Moon, too.
I also agree that you might have too much hand disruption. Jund is all about hand disruption, and their best creature gets bigger as graveyards fill up, but they still run only 5-6 1 CMC disruption spells, backed by 3-4 Lili's. We have TKS, instead of Lili, which--unlike IoK/Thoughtseize--is still a good topdeck late game.
In the side, I tried Ghostly Prison for a little bit, but it didn't do what I wanted it to against the go-wide decks, so I haven't run it for a while. And I'm not sure what deck Leyline of Sanctity would be needed against, other than RG Valakut decks. The Burn match is already very good with Alliance and Brutality, I find. Have you considered Runed Halo? That can be hard to cast on-curve, though.
I don't think 23 lands with no mind stones is where you want to be, this deck has a very high mana curve and you're basically short two lands (I would count two mind stones as 1 land). If you get stuck on two lands and miss even 1 land drop you're in trouble.
I also think CoBr replaced the need for inquisition, inquisition is such a dead draw late game and 8 discard is a lot, I feel like you'll find yourself top decking it mid to late game too often.
Fair enough, you're probably right regarding the lands. Mind Stone... I don't know. What does your typical turn 1-4 look like when playing Mind Stone, could you give me some examples? If your t1 isn't discard, aren't you dead by turn 3-4 by doing nothing turn 1-2 ?
CoBr over IoK, I get your point and haven't thought of it that way. I will definitely give that a go.
I agree that 23 lands and no Mind Stones may be too greedy. Mind Stone really makes 2-land keeps workable, when they would otherwise be very risky in many cases. I think you should at least stay at 24 lands if you aren't running Stone. Stone is a big help against Blood Moon, too.
I also agree that you might have too much hand disruption. Jund is all about hand disruption, and their best creature gets bigger as graveyards fill up, but they still run only 5-6 1 CMC disruption spells, backed by 3-4 Lili's. We have TKS, instead of Lili, which--unlike IoK/Thoughtseize--is still a good topdeck late game.
In the side, I tried Ghostly Prison for a little bit, but it didn't do what I wanted it to against the go-wide decks, so I haven't run it for a while. And I'm not sure what deck Leyline of Sanctity would be needed against, other than RG Valakut decks. The Burn match is already very good with Alliance and Brutality, I find. Have you considered Runed Halo? That can be hard to cast on-curve, though.
I feel like I need to rely a lot on hand disruption since we're a late starter. When playing Mind Stone turn 2 for example, you won't have any board presence up until turn 3. A t1 discard for me is a must in that case. Am I wrong here and do you have other experience with this? Blood Moon might see presence this weekend, so I'm leaning towards playing Mind Stone. Seeing you both play it in your decks and have no problems with it, I'll give it another go.
There aren't that many wide decks like Elves so for me I think Prison will do the job. You're probably right about Leyline although that prevents Junk/Jund from discarding our cards as well, except for Lili of course.
With 23 lands and 4 5-drops, you are going to have too many situations where you cannot play your cards. 23 mana gives you a 50% chance to have 5 lands if you have drawn 12 cards (including your opening hand), which means that even on the draw, NOT taking a mulligan, you will not be able to cast your Reality Smasher on turn 5 (percentage is a bit higher in reality due to Eldrazi Temple). With 24 lands and 2 Mind Stones this changes to 67%, so in 2 out of 3 games. This difference is what makes it probable that you can play your Smashers in the majority of your games, and not only in half. The same odds calculated for a turn 4 Though-Knot Seer: 68% to 80% with 11 cards drawn. For me, TKS is a must-have play in this deck, and these plays I usually try to get as close to 80% probability as I can (4 out of 5 games sees me able to make them, if I draw the card).
If you know your meta has many non-creature spells that really hurt you, then playing 6 discard spells is probably a good approach! You get your chances of drawing one latest turn 3 from 53% to 68%, given 10 cards (a little less with 9), which is the same argument as above, if this is a play you want to see in the majority of your games.
Excel is your friend
Jan
Agreed, although discard doesn't necessarily mean 'pick the non-creature spell'.
Good to hear some opinions on this, wanted to see if I was undervaluing Strangler or overvaluing Push, turns out it was both!
Another question/poll for you guys: Tidehollow Sculler. Anyone still running him? How is he doing for you guys? Do you miss other cards that would be in his place? I might want to try some scullers in the future, but I'm not sure where to make the cuts. Thoughtseize has been insane for me, but there are some games where I feel that I have no pressure, something Sculler could provide. Let me know what you think!
Liliana, the Last Hope is something I've been thinking about recently. It has some good upside with adding a couple win-cons to the deck. One being recurring smashers, the other Lili's ultimate. Smasher is such a strong creature, chain casting them or getting multiple on the field at once closes out grindy or longer games very quickly. Lili's ult can win the game as well, and we have plenty of board presence to defend her while she upticks. There's a downside with the non-bo of relic clearing our GY of creatures to recur, and we don't run a lot of creatures so the two she mills won't even come close to reliably giving us something to bring back to hand. I think adding win cons to the deck is really good, especially on a planeswalker which is generally harder for opponents to deal with than creatures. To those of you who have played her in the deck, some questions: How effective has her (-2) been at recurring threats, and how consistent? Does she under perform against linear aggro and get sided out, and kept in for grindier games? How often has her ultimate sealed a game? Would love any and all feedback on the card.
DCteamup, that is true about the first turn play and the aggro decks. However that is also the nature of the deck we play, to an extent. I have found the most success in playing to start slow and then become to much to handle mid- to late-game. I love T1 disruption, but I also seem to get by pretty well with playing one of my seven tapland(ish) lands--namely, Vent, Shrine, or Flats--into a T2 Stone/Relic, or Relic/disruption, or Relic/threaten cracking it, or Reshaper. Another common line is T1 Relic, T2 Strangler-->kill something. I usually count on T3 as being my crucial turn to get my game plan active. Sometimes the deck is too slow, it's true. Push will help with this though.
Against BGx or 8-Rack hand disruption decks, I feel I can say with 100% certainty that siding out all our own disruption for more removal works out fine. We don't need to side in protection from disruption because we topdeck a lot better than they do, and we see more cards due to Relic, Stone, and Reshaper (and Wreckage, in builds that play it).
Finally, if you want to prepare for Moon, I am very pleased with having a Wastes somewhere in the 75. Here's how that usually plays out for me: Get a Plains ASAP. You can use Flats, Path, or Ghost Quarter for this. Then, get whichever basic you need next more, usually a Swamp. Use the same tools--or you have twice the chance to just draw into it, because there are two of them. Finally, get either the Wastes (from Path or GQ) or a Stone in play--and you have three times the chance to get one of these, compared to Plains, so drawing into one of them is actually reasonably likely. BTW maindeck Stone is something a Blood Moon player just hates to see, usually it will equal a game loss for them in G1 if we find it.
Pariah, for me, Sculler is too mana-greedy. And it dies to almost everything. But some players do like it a lot.
schuppius, I think you're right about the lack of a go-to 2 CMC card. I think we get around that largely through Temple making Reshaper (and, less often, Strangler) a T2 play, and through the power of T3 Souls followed by big spaghetti. I agree that Sculler followed by Strangler is awesome, but I wonder if that might be better in Herder/Displacer build than it is in a Reshaper/Smasher build, because needing less C means more room for BW.
Also, would you be willing to post a link to your Excel doc? I'd like to play around with it a little myself, if you don't mind.
Tituba9, I am wary of three and four drops that have two colored mana requirements in this deck. I think either Lili could be quite good, but I can also see them being dead-in-hand more often than I'd like, without a restructured mana base. Still, I haven't tried out either so I'm just theory crafting here. Also, I don't know what I would cut for a Lili.
And for reference, the best analysis of the "Bolt test" that I have read (which was instrumental in my understanding of how to make this deck strong despite being slow, and why, for instance, I haven't been a supporter of Eldrazi Displacer in the deck): http://modernnexus.com/eldritch-moon-thalia-bolt-test/
Tituba9, I am wary of three and four drops that have two colored mana requirements in this deck. I think either Lili could be quite good, but I can also see them being dead-in-hand more often than I'd like, without a restructured mana base. Still, I haven't tried out either so I'm just theory crafting here. Also, I don't know what I would cut for a Lili.
Sorin has very rarely been a problem to cast on T4 for me, probably due to the fetid heath I run to make those cards easier to cast (as well as shambling activations, as that requires you to have two B/W sources other than the shambling). I'd cut a reshaper down to two, I haven't been as big on the card as I was a while ago. I still think its really good but I also have been experiencing opponents being able to deal with it through exile effects like Anger of the Gods or just ignoring it and winning before it gets the chance to die and trigger. I think we want to minimize the amount of cards/turns that we do nothing to impact the game, so for that reason I have no issues going down to 2 reshapers if it means adding a threat like Lili. I do like the Last Hope over Lili of the Veil in our deck though, we dont dump our hands like jund, we often hold cards in our hand for opportune casting value (strangler for example), and we also can't discard our extra land cards in hand like jund can do, we need lands to cast expensive cards.
okay I do have to ask now that aether revolt is now spoiled. Do you think we will have to worry about the new bad twin combo (saheeli and the 4 cmc white beast). I know that modern has a great many other options, but this also seems like it is kind of fragile.
I went a disappointing 1-3 at FNM this week, in 2 of the 3 losses they were 2-1's that were very close and competitive, the topdecks just were very lackluster. Sometimes the deck does feel inconsistent and durdley, where you dig and dig and only see lands and cantrips.
Did a couple friendly leagues on mtgo after that, first one was 3-2 and the second was 4-1, finally getting a couple solid dredge wins in there (as well as at least 1 dredge loss). The exciting thing is in the 4-1 league I got 3 money cards out of my 4 prize chests and got 34 Tix, which I immediately used to get a Fetid Heath and Liliana, the Last Hope for some testing. Like a fool I had been evaluating the card as a 4 drop, (2)(B)(B), when it in fact a 3 drop. I'm way more excited to try it out and I get to play a lot more online as it is, meaning I get to test the card out before buying it in paper. I will report how effective it is, and the wide open meta of mtgo leagues should give lots of different looks.
I achieved my first top 8 ever! And the timing couldn't be better, at the Invitational event where I have been qualifying for last year.
Unfortunately, my first game in the top 8 I lost straight away with 2-0. It was against Grixis Delver where he had answers to everything. Letting me play my Lingering Souls and countering all my big dudes.
Won 2-1 against Living End
Game 1 he got me end of my turn 2 by exiling SSG and casting his cascade spell, cycling Street Wraith on the stack, drawing a Street Wraith, cycling a Street Wraith, drawing a Street Wraith and cycling a Street Wraith, then attacking for 12 his turn 3. Game 2 and 3 I won by Relic/Thoughtseize/TKS
Won 2-0 against UWR, basically 4 Reality Smashers he couldn't keep up with.
Lost 2-0 against Bring to Scapeshift, after losing game 1, and him playing Platinum Emperion and saying "now I wonder if you boarded out your Path's", which I indeed did
Won 2-1 against Burn. He won first game like he's supposed to, high pressure and loads of burn. Game 2 he had to mull to 4 and got me to 7 eventually, but he Skull Cracked end of my turn because he was stuck on 2 mana and felt like he had to do something, and in response I healed 4 with Blessed Alliance. Game 3 I healed off of Timely Reinforcements both times, 1 time from Blessed Alliance and once from a Sorin-ed Reality Smasher for 22 lifegain in total, that was too much apparently
After the surprise early B&R announcement today, I expect Tron to get a big boost in meta share. Not great for midrange build like this one, if I turn out to be right.
3 Path and 2 Push MB instead of 4 Path and 1 Go for the Throat. Also still mulling over swapping out the Unmaking for a 4/2 or even 3/3 spot removal package, but the out to Vial, Moon, walkers, etc. still feels pretty relevant.
4 Flats and 3 Caves instead of the other way around.
A third Push SB instead of a Throat, Dismember, Wail, Sudden Death etc.
Main problem being that a lowered fast-aggro presence (after the announcement and the release of AER on the 20th) could lead to a pretty good uptick in Tron (and, god forbid, RG Valakut) decks, and the 75 won't support a strong game against both archetypes.
If Tron comes back, it might be worth re-considering Crucible of Worlds and/or multiple Surgical Extractions for the deck. In fact, if Tron does come back, it might be right to run one Extraction mainboard in place of a Relic.
List is tight. It'll be interesting to see how everything shakes out over the next few months.
I'm super stoked about the git probe ban. Decks like infect and suicide zoo/bloo get a massive advantage against interactive decks when they look at their hand and dig for a card with zero mana on turn 1. It makes the match lopsided, where they have more answers and also know our answers, making it easier for them to sequence and get a quicker win. Even with git probe the infect matchup for us was very chess-like and skill intensive, now they get to play like we do, not being 100% confident of the removal in our hand just like we most often are not aware of their pumps/hexproof cards. With the probe loss and the addition of fatal push we should be pretty well matched against these decks.
I definitely agree that our biggest problems will now be living end, tron, and Valakut. Basically the decks that aren't midrange and aren't linear aggro. A sideboard with two surgicals, and 1-2 ghost quarters (depending on number of ghost quarters in the main, I can see 4 in the 75 as being a must), 2 pithings, 2 anguished (in the 75), 1-2 Stony silence, would be a good start to helping those matchups. Getting a land destroy into a surgical on a tron land or on Valakut helps us out a lot. What other cards are houses in these matchups?
I am all for going down to 3 relics, with strangler as the only need to use for processing, and with siding them all out in quite a few match ups, with the dredge ban, I definitely think we can get by with 3 relics now. We've got mind stones and reshaper for cantripping, and we need as many cards that are either a threat or an answer, we need to make room somewhere. I'm not sure about dropping to 3 paths, it hits almost everything and is important against wurmcoils, ulamog, in tron and tasigur and angler in grixis, along with killing the smaller creatures which push can also do. I guess I'm trying to reason it that I want more of the unconditional removal than three conditional one, more often I'm going to want path and I'd rather have the unconditional removal as well as give them a land.
What does push and the bans mean for batterskull in the main deck? It is an all star in games that go long enough for the to hit the field, could the meta be slow enough for this to make a comeback, or is 5 CMC with no ramp from eldrazi temple still too late?
I am quite pumped for these changes as it should favor both processors and my backup/tiered deck tron.
So I did some thinking about the B+R announcement today, and after reading some of the comments here I was wondering if maybe now isn't a good time to dust off our Blight Herders again. With Control and Midrange probably on the rise after this announcement, (plus the release of Fatal Push) it might not be a bad idea to try and out-value our opponents on the midrange plan with a Herder or two. I might try cutting 3x Reshaper for 2x Herder and another Mind Stone (to compensate for a higher curve, and to cantrip since we have taken out Reshaper)
Literally just spitballing the idea here, but if we expect the B/G/X decks to see an increase in play, It might be in our best interest to have a value engine like Herder. Herder is usually also good vs control, since the trigger is on CAST not ETB, and control may also see an uptick in popularity. Hell, Herder isn't even terrible vs Tron Game 1, since it Dodges Ugin and Karn only gets rid of 1/4 of it.
I honestly dont know what the B+R announcement does for us, but if the meta becomes slower, our archetype gets better. I also agree with Deaddrift and Tituba as far as reevaluating the sideboard, and possibly cutting a relic. With dredge getting hit by the bannings, and with midrange decks predicted to be on the rise, I think we could do better than a 2 Mana cantrip topdeck; maybe this is where we can find space for the maindeck Anguished Unmaking. Also, if we manage our relics properly we will have minimal loss of effectiveness; cutting one might lose us some percentage points vs B/G/X decks, but I expect that to be made up for by the inclusion of Fatal Push. Tron/Valakut still feels like slogging through the muck, but maybe jamming more threats (or the GQ/Crucible Package) can help us even the odds there. Other than that, I feel that we are still fairly positioned at the moment, not a ton of other matchups stick out as terrible to me as of right now. I'll have a tournament report for you guys after Wednesday to let you know what decks popped up and what some of my shop thinks about the bannings as well. I have a lot of experienced players a the shop playing T1 decks, so it might be good to hear some opinions from them. Cheers!
Finally completed the deck on paper yesterday (ok, missing cavern of souls...)! I'm very happy and eager to test it out. Went 2-2 last week on FNM with incomplete list, losing to uw Emeria, rg shamans and got easy wins through burn and junk. And now the meta seems just to be adjusting to our strategy. I was using 4 relics md and 1/1 surgical and rest in peace on my sb (cause relice alone just isn't enough). Now i feel like dropping RiP for a second surgical for the tron/valakut decks and a relic for Liliana... Also, i'm having too much trouble with emrakul decks and considering an 1-of to the slaughter...It also helps the match against tron and Walker dependent decks, like nahiri and Jund. Also, one Card i'm testing for real is Wall of Reverence. This thing is a beast against aggro decks like burn and Bant Eldrazi, considering it drops on t3; it blocks smasher and flyers, delver, tasigur, and the Life gain with smasher or tks is too much to a lot of decks to handle. One trigger and you're out of valakut range for a couple turns.
Another Card i'm considering is 1-of endbringer, as he can nulifly an annoying blocker or attacker, draw multiples on late game, when we most need, and is a nice interaction with Lili.
I have righ hopes for our deck in the new meta that's rising and soon will share my resultados and list.
This is the best list I can come up with with these B/R updates, but I'm just not quite satisfied with the sideboard. The maindeck looks pretty solid, I went up to 3 Reshapers because there should be less decks going over the top or ignoring it, more grindy games where it dies to combat or bolt or push,and matchups like tron and valakut where T2 reshaper is a great start to putting on a fast clock. 2 Cavern of souls and 2 Ghost quarters, I would like to play 3 GQ's maindeck a lot, but there is an insane amount of blue control in my area and the Cavern of Souls brings many tears. I need to maindeck two of them to be able to cast my eldrazi with no regard to counters, it changes the matchup against U tron and UW control immensly when you can jam your eldrazi. Without Caverns on mtgo it feels much less effective to bait counters or play around them. I was at a 2/2 split of Thoughtseize and CoBr, but definitely back up to 3 TS now with the probe ban. We need to disrupt the opponent's plan T1, we need to see their hand, we need to be able to take everything from ensnaring bridge to thought-knot to karn, and we don't give no ****s about paying 2 life and fetch-shocking down to 15 to do it because we cool like that. For some reason 3 relics and 2 mind stones just feels right. It feels like those durdley opens where you draw into 3 relics and a mind stone in the first 4 draws should happen way less, outside of these 5 cards every non-land card outside of a lategame thoughtseize is going to do something for us. 3 relics should be more than enough to power strangler, and the need to always have it against snapcaster decks isn't too high as we are already favored against those decks, same thing with Jund (which we should be feasting on as it rises once again). I honestly think I'd go down to even 2 relics maindeck before I'd cut any of the other cards out, especially since I want to keep 4 paths so I wouldn't be losing out on too much exiling early in the game. 2 mind stones feel necessary, think of it as a relic that gives us ramp rather than interacts with the graveyard at a cost of 1 more CMC to cast, seems good. It enables us to ramp and put the pressure on the -should be- slower meta, and it also enables T3 damnation which is the nuts against decks like elves and merfolk and zoo.
The sideboard feels like it should have 17 slots, hell 20. The 2-ofs as it stands I feel need to be 2-ofs, because of the need to have them early and because drawing both copies in 1 game isn't bad at all. I really want a second surgical and a second stony in there. Maybe a fatal push in the side isn't necessary? We keep it in against most of the field so why would we need a third to bring in when we can't take enough cards out to make room? Wastes feels needed unless you are all but certain you won't be seeing a blood moon opponent, ghost quarter to swap out for cavern when cavern isn't needed. EE/ratchet as sweepers, fish and elves are still very much a thing, and ratchet is a catch-all we need. I had a very hard time taking ratchet out of the maindeck because of how versatile it is, and the need to have a catch-all that isn't anguished so it can easily remove blood moon, but ultimately I need to think of game 1 as trying to execute my deck's plan rather than commit to per-emptively stopping the opponent's. Games 2 and 3 are still very winnable thanks to the sideboard. A second anguish to bring in against infect and tron, mostly tron. It's also quite fine againt jund as that matchup is all about topdecking more removal/threats and whoever draws more durdle loses. A second CoBr to bring in against burn and infect, with it's synergy with Lingering Souls we definitely want to be able to bring in a second copy for dat value. But a second stony silence and second surgical should be in there. Stony is a card we want in an opening hand against tron or affinity, is 1 enough to draw it when we need it? Is two too much because of all the artifacts we ourselves run? And the second surgical to pull off the combo-wombo against tron and valakut, but do we really need two surgicals against any other matchups (it is still very very good against dredge, which isn't entirely gone with the latest ban but I also have literally never seen anyone at any local stores play dredge in a paper tournament).
Let me know what you think of the maindeck, and how you'd fill out the cramped sideboard. It's hard to speculate on where the meta of modern will go, but I think it's safe to say it will get slower and grindier, Jund and Tron will be increasing, as will blood moon decks.
Coming Saturday is a championship after last year's qualifications. 24 players will be competing for the title. Expected meta is BW Eldrazi Taxes, Bant Eldrazi, Burn, Infect, Grixis Control, Kiln Fiend, Merfolk and Midrange. The players competing have also been seen with Madcap, 5C Bring to Light, Tron, Skred, Affinity, Titan Breach and Ad Nauseam. Yes it can go all directions
I'm thinking about playing this list, could I get your guys' thoughts? Last times I tried Mind Stone I didn't like it so much. I'm taking a more discard approach rather than the ramp.
1 Concealed Courtyard
1 Plains
2 Swamp
4 Caves of Koilos
2 Shambling Vent
3 Godless Shrine
4 Eldrazi Temple
3 Marsh Flats
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Vault of the Archangel
4 Path to Exile
1 Go for the Throat
Sorcery - 12
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Toughtseize
2 Collective Brutality
4 Lingering Souls
Artifact - 4
4 Relic of Progenitus
1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
Creatures - 15
4 Wasteland Strangler
3 Matter Reshaper
4 Thought-Knot Seet
4 Reality Smasher
As for the SB it will probably contain Blessed Alliance, Wrath of God, Ghostly Prison, Celestial Purge, Disenchant, Timely Reinforcements, Pithing Needle and Leyline of Sanctity. Exact SB still to be determined..
Main board options that I'm still thinking about:
-1 Relic of Progenitus, +1 Matter Reshaper
-1 Inquisition of Kozilek, -1 Relic of Progenitus, +2 Blessed Alliance (meta looks aggro heavy)
-1 Relic of Progenitus, -1 Thoughtseize, -1 Go for the Throat, +3 Tidehollow Sculler (more hand ripping into processing, plus it eats bolts)
Thanks in advance!
1 Fetid Heath
1 Plains
2 Swamp
3 Caves of Koilos
2 Shambling Vent
2 Godless Shrine
4 Eldrazi Temple
4 Marsh Flats
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Vault of the Archangel
2 Cavern of Souls
Instant - 7
4 Path to Exile
2 Fatal Push
1 Anguished Unmaking
2 Thoughtseize
1 Collective Brutality
4 Lingering Souls
Artifact - 7
4 Relic of Progenitus
2 Mind Stone
1 Ratchet Bomb
Planeswalker - 1
1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
Creatures - 14
4 Wasteland Strangler
2 Matter Reshaper
4 Thought-Knot Seer
4 Reality Smasher
2 Damnation
2 Pithing Needle
2 Blessed Alliance
2 Stony Silence
1 Collective Brutality
1 Fatal Push
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Ratchet Bomb
1 Wastes
1 Engineered Explosives
This is my first list post-Aether Revolt release. The sideboard is setup to help with tron, go-wide strategies, blood moon, and extra removal/discard. The main deck looks like it could maybe use Liliana, the Last Hope or maybe a revisit to Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet as some additional threats.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
I also think CoBr replaced the need for inquisition, inquisition is such a dead draw late game and 8 discard is a lot, I feel like you'll find yourself top decking it mid to late game too often.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
I would not cut strangler. I would move one in the main with one or two in the side. strangler is another important control aspect in many forms for us, plus it makes relic all that much more worth it.
I think that in Processors we might want to go a little easy with how many Pushes we run. In our deck, we don't actually have room for a whole lot of fetch lands. We also may need to keep up a threat of a Relic crack, or we might not have the mana for both that and Push, or we might have a Souls in the yard, or have some other reason to not want to crack Relic just to kill Kalitas, Resto, Rhino, or what-have-you. It seems to me that the real strength of Push, for a deck that also runs White, is that it can kill the early drops without penalty. In fact, I wonder if dropping a Path for a Push might actually be the right play, to increase the likelihood of having the right early removal in our opener.
I 100% do not think that cutting Stranglers for Herders because Push is a thing is going to work out. Siding out Relics doesn't usually mean that Strangler gets nerfed too badly, because of the one-card requirement, and Relic is really irrelevant in matches against decks that don't use the graveyard for power. I side out all four Relics all the time for more relevant spells, but that would sure be harder to do with a move to Herder. One Path or one Seer can turn on Strangler's removal; Meanwhile, Herder is still sitting there waiting for gas. Nowadays, Relic is not in the deck because it powers Processing. Or at least, not primarily for that. It is here to hate on the many graveyard-reliant decks, and also to power Processing. I agree that 23 lands and no Mind Stones may be too greedy. Mind Stone really makes 2-land keeps workable, when they would otherwise be very risky in many cases. I think you should at least stay at 24 lands if you aren't running Stone. Stone is a big help against Blood Moon, too.
I also agree that you might have too much hand disruption. Jund is all about hand disruption, and their best creature gets bigger as graveyards fill up, but they still run only 5-6 1 CMC disruption spells, backed by 3-4 Lili's. We have TKS, instead of Lili, which--unlike IoK/Thoughtseize--is still a good topdeck late game.
In the side, I tried Ghostly Prison for a little bit, but it didn't do what I wanted it to against the go-wide decks, so I haven't run it for a while. And I'm not sure what deck Leyline of Sanctity would be needed against, other than RG Valakut decks. The Burn match is already very good with Alliance and Brutality, I find. Have you considered Runed Halo? That can be hard to cast on-curve, though.
Fair enough, you're probably right regarding the lands. Mind Stone... I don't know. What does your typical turn 1-4 look like when playing Mind Stone, could you give me some examples? If your t1 isn't discard, aren't you dead by turn 3-4 by doing nothing turn 1-2 ?
CoBr over IoK, I get your point and haven't thought of it that way. I will definitely give that a go.
I feel like I need to rely a lot on hand disruption since we're a late starter. When playing Mind Stone turn 2 for example, you won't have any board presence up until turn 3. A t1 discard for me is a must in that case. Am I wrong here and do you have other experience with this? Blood Moon might see presence this weekend, so I'm leaning towards playing Mind Stone. Seeing you both play it in your decks and have no problems with it, I'll give it another go.
There aren't that many wide decks like Elves so for me I think Prison will do the job. You're probably right about Leyline although that prevents Junk/Jund from discarding our cards as well, except for Lili of course.
Agreed, although discard doesn't necessarily mean 'pick the non-creature spell'.
So with 3 Thoughtseizes and 2 Collective Brutality (and 4 Thought-Knot Seer) I'd be on 9 discard. Should be OK. Then I'll cut 3 Inquisition of Kozilek for 2 Mind Stone and 1 more land.
Thanks a lot for your inputs.
Another question/poll for you guys: Tidehollow Sculler. Anyone still running him? How is he doing for you guys? Do you miss other cards that would be in his place? I might want to try some scullers in the future, but I'm not sure where to make the cuts. Thoughtseize has been insane for me, but there are some games where I feel that I have no pressure, something Sculler could provide. Let me know what you think!
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
Against BGx or 8-Rack hand disruption decks, I feel I can say with 100% certainty that siding out all our own disruption for more removal works out fine. We don't need to side in protection from disruption because we topdeck a lot better than they do, and we see more cards due to Relic, Stone, and Reshaper (and Wreckage, in builds that play it).
Finally, if you want to prepare for Moon, I am very pleased with having a Wastes somewhere in the 75. Here's how that usually plays out for me: Get a Plains ASAP. You can use Flats, Path, or Ghost Quarter for this. Then, get whichever basic you need next more, usually a Swamp. Use the same tools--or you have twice the chance to just draw into it, because there are two of them. Finally, get either the Wastes (from Path or GQ) or a Stone in play--and you have three times the chance to get one of these, compared to Plains, so drawing into one of them is actually reasonably likely. BTW maindeck Stone is something a Blood Moon player just hates to see, usually it will equal a game loss for them in G1 if we find it.
Pariah, for me, Sculler is too mana-greedy. And it dies to almost everything. But some players do like it a lot.
schuppius, I think you're right about the lack of a go-to 2 CMC card. I think we get around that largely through Temple making Reshaper (and, less often, Strangler) a T2 play, and through the power of T3 Souls followed by big spaghetti. I agree that Sculler followed by Strangler is awesome, but I wonder if that might be better in Herder/Displacer build than it is in a Reshaper/Smasher build, because needing less C means more room for BW.
Also, would you be willing to post a link to your Excel doc? I'd like to play around with it a little myself, if you don't mind.
Tituba9, I am wary of three and four drops that have two colored mana requirements in this deck. I think either Lili could be quite good, but I can also see them being dead-in-hand more often than I'd like, without a restructured mana base. Still, I haven't tried out either so I'm just theory crafting here. Also, I don't know what I would cut for a Lili.
I thought the recent Modern Nexus articles touching on Fatal Push were pretty well reasoned, here are links if anyone is interested in some ideas about how these cards may affect the format:
http://modernnexus.com/evaluating-fatal-push/
http://modernnexus.com/introducing-push-test/
And for reference, the best analysis of the "Bolt test" that I have read (which was instrumental in my understanding of how to make this deck strong despite being slow, and why, for instance, I haven't been a supporter of Eldrazi Displacer in the deck):
http://modernnexus.com/eldritch-moon-thalia-bolt-test/
Sorin has very rarely been a problem to cast on T4 for me, probably due to the fetid heath I run to make those cards easier to cast (as well as shambling activations, as that requires you to have two B/W sources other than the shambling). I'd cut a reshaper down to two, I haven't been as big on the card as I was a while ago. I still think its really good but I also have been experiencing opponents being able to deal with it through exile effects like Anger of the Gods or just ignoring it and winning before it gets the chance to die and trigger. I think we want to minimize the amount of cards/turns that we do nothing to impact the game, so for that reason I have no issues going down to 2 reshapers if it means adding a threat like Lili. I do like the Last Hope over Lili of the Veil in our deck though, we dont dump our hands like jund, we often hold cards in our hand for opportune casting value (strangler for example), and we also can't discard our extra land cards in hand like jund can do, we need lands to cast expensive cards.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
Did a couple friendly leagues on mtgo after that, first one was 3-2 and the second was 4-1, finally getting a couple solid dredge wins in there (as well as at least 1 dredge loss). The exciting thing is in the 4-1 league I got 3 money cards out of my 4 prize chests and got 34 Tix, which I immediately used to get a Fetid Heath and Liliana, the Last Hope for some testing. Like a fool I had been evaluating the card as a 4 drop, (2)(B)(B), when it in fact a 3 drop. I'm way more excited to try it out and I get to play a lot more online as it is, meaning I get to test the card out before buying it in paper. I will report how effective it is, and the wide open meta of mtgo leagues should give lots of different looks.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
Unfortunately, my first game in the top 8 I lost straight away with 2-0. It was against Grixis Delver where he had answers to everything. Letting me play my Lingering Souls and countering all my big dudes.
Won 2-1 against Living End
Game 1 he got me end of my turn 2 by exiling SSG and casting his cascade spell, cycling Street Wraith on the stack, drawing a Street Wraith, cycling a Street Wraith, drawing a Street Wraith and cycling a Street Wraith, then attacking for 12 his turn 3. Game 2 and 3 I won by Relic/Thoughtseize/TKS
Won 2-0 against UWR, basically 4 Reality Smashers he couldn't keep up with.
Lost 2-0 against Bring to Scapeshift, after losing game 1, and him playing Platinum Emperion and saying "now I wonder if you boarded out your Path's", which I indeed did
Won 2-1 against Burn. He won first game like he's supposed to, high pressure and loads of burn. Game 2 he had to mull to 4 and got me to 7 eventually, but he Skull Cracked end of my turn because he was stuck on 2 mana and felt like he had to do something, and in response I healed 4 with Blessed Alliance. Game 3 I healed off of Timely Reinforcements both times, 1 time from Blessed Alliance and once from a Sorin-ed Reality Smasher for 22 lifegain in total, that was too much apparently
ID-ed for top 8! Then lost against Grixis as said
Eventually I played this list:
1 Concealed Courtyard
1 Plains
2 Swamp
4 Caves of Koilos
2 Shambling Vent
3 Godless Shrine
4 Eldrazi Temple
3 Marsh Flats
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Vault of the Archangel
1 Sea Gate Wreckage
4 Path to Exile
1 Go for the Throat
Sorcery - 9
3 Toughtseize
2 Collective Brutality
4 Lingering Souls
Artifact - 6
2 Mind Stone
4 Relic of Progenitus
Planeswalker - 1
1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
Creatures - 15
4 Wasteland Strangler
3 Matter Reshaper
4 Thought-Knot Seet
4 Reality Smasher
3 Blessed Alliance
2 Timely Reinforcements
2 Pithing Needle
2 Disenchant
2 Celestial Purge
2 Warping Wail
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Wrath of God
- 3 Path and 2 Push MB instead of 4 Path and 1 Go for the Throat. Also still mulling over swapping out the Unmaking for a 4/2 or even 3/3 spot removal package, but the out to Vial, Moon, walkers, etc. still feels pretty relevant.
- 4 Flats and 3 Caves instead of the other way around.
- A third Push SB instead of a Throat, Dismember, Wail, Sudden Death etc.
Main problem being that a lowered fast-aggro presence (after the announcement and the release of AER on the 20th) could lead to a pretty good uptick in Tron (and, god forbid, RG Valakut) decks, and the 75 won't support a strong game against both archetypes.If Tron comes back, it might be worth re-considering Crucible of Worlds and/or multiple Surgical Extractions for the deck. In fact, if Tron does come back, it might be right to run one Extraction mainboard in place of a Relic.
List is tight. It'll be interesting to see how everything shakes out over the next few months.
I definitely agree that our biggest problems will now be living end, tron, and Valakut. Basically the decks that aren't midrange and aren't linear aggro. A sideboard with two surgicals, and 1-2 ghost quarters (depending on number of ghost quarters in the main, I can see 4 in the 75 as being a must), 2 pithings, 2 anguished (in the 75), 1-2 Stony silence, would be a good start to helping those matchups. Getting a land destroy into a surgical on a tron land or on Valakut helps us out a lot. What other cards are houses in these matchups?
I am all for going down to 3 relics, with strangler as the only need to use for processing, and with siding them all out in quite a few match ups, with the dredge ban, I definitely think we can get by with 3 relics now. We've got mind stones and reshaper for cantripping, and we need as many cards that are either a threat or an answer, we need to make room somewhere. I'm not sure about dropping to 3 paths, it hits almost everything and is important against wurmcoils, ulamog, in tron and tasigur and angler in grixis, along with killing the smaller creatures which push can also do. I guess I'm trying to reason it that I want more of the unconditional removal than three conditional one, more often I'm going to want path and I'd rather have the unconditional removal as well as give them a land.
What does push and the bans mean for batterskull in the main deck? It is an all star in games that go long enough for the to hit the field, could the meta be slow enough for this to make a comeback, or is 5 CMC with no ramp from eldrazi temple still too late?
I am quite pumped for these changes as it should favor both processors and my backup/tiered deck tron.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
So I did some thinking about the B+R announcement today, and after reading some of the comments here I was wondering if maybe now isn't a good time to dust off our Blight Herders again. With Control and Midrange probably on the rise after this announcement, (plus the release of Fatal Push) it might not be a bad idea to try and out-value our opponents on the midrange plan with a Herder or two. I might try cutting 3x Reshaper for 2x Herder and another Mind Stone (to compensate for a higher curve, and to cantrip since we have taken out Reshaper)
Literally just spitballing the idea here, but if we expect the B/G/X decks to see an increase in play, It might be in our best interest to have a value engine like Herder. Herder is usually also good vs control, since the trigger is on CAST not ETB, and control may also see an uptick in popularity. Hell, Herder isn't even terrible vs Tron Game 1, since it Dodges Ugin and Karn only gets rid of 1/4 of it.
I honestly dont know what the B+R announcement does for us, but if the meta becomes slower, our archetype gets better. I also agree with Deaddrift and Tituba as far as reevaluating the sideboard, and possibly cutting a relic. With dredge getting hit by the bannings, and with midrange decks predicted to be on the rise, I think we could do better than a 2 Mana cantrip topdeck; maybe this is where we can find space for the maindeck Anguished Unmaking. Also, if we manage our relics properly we will have minimal loss of effectiveness; cutting one might lose us some percentage points vs B/G/X decks, but I expect that to be made up for by the inclusion of Fatal Push. Tron/Valakut still feels like slogging through the muck, but maybe jamming more threats (or the GQ/Crucible Package) can help us even the odds there. Other than that, I feel that we are still fairly positioned at the moment, not a ton of other matchups stick out as terrible to me as of right now. I'll have a tournament report for you guys after Wednesday to let you know what decks popped up and what some of my shop thinks about the bannings as well. I have a lot of experienced players a the shop playing T1 decks, so it might be good to hear some opinions from them. Cheers!
Another Card i'm considering is 1-of endbringer, as he can nulifly an annoying blocker or attacker, draw multiples on late game, when we most need, and is a nice interaction with Lili.
I have righ hopes for our deck in the new meta that's rising and soon will share my resultados and list.
Greetings from Brazil!
1 Fetid Heath
1 Plains
2 Swamp
3 Caves of Koilos
2 Shambling Vent
2 Godless Shrine
4 Eldrazi Temple
4 Marsh Flats
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Vault of the Archangel
2 Cavern of Souls
Instant - 7
4 Path to Exile
2 Fatal Push
1 Anguished Unmaking
3 Thoughtseize
1 Collective Brutality
4 Lingering Souls
Artifact - 5
3 Relic of Progenitus
2 Mind Stone
Planeswalker - 1
1 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
Creatures - 15
4 Wasteland Strangler
3 Matter Reshaper
4 Thought-Knot Seer
4 Reality Smasher
2 Damnation
2 Pithing Needle
2 Blessed Alliance
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Stony Silence
1 Collective Brutality
1 Fatal Push
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Ratchet Bomb
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Wastes
1 Engineered Explosives
This is the best list I can come up with with these B/R updates, but I'm just not quite satisfied with the sideboard. The maindeck looks pretty solid, I went up to 3 Reshapers because there should be less decks going over the top or ignoring it, more grindy games where it dies to combat or bolt or push,and matchups like tron and valakut where T2 reshaper is a great start to putting on a fast clock. 2 Cavern of souls and 2 Ghost quarters, I would like to play 3 GQ's maindeck a lot, but there is an insane amount of blue control in my area and the Cavern of Souls brings many tears. I need to maindeck two of them to be able to cast my eldrazi with no regard to counters, it changes the matchup against U tron and UW control immensly when you can jam your eldrazi. Without Caverns on mtgo it feels much less effective to bait counters or play around them. I was at a 2/2 split of Thoughtseize and CoBr, but definitely back up to 3 TS now with the probe ban. We need to disrupt the opponent's plan T1, we need to see their hand, we need to be able to take everything from ensnaring bridge to thought-knot to karn, and we don't give no ****s about paying 2 life and fetch-shocking down to 15 to do it because we cool like that. For some reason 3 relics and 2 mind stones just feels right. It feels like those durdley opens where you draw into 3 relics and a mind stone in the first 4 draws should happen way less, outside of these 5 cards every non-land card outside of a lategame thoughtseize is going to do something for us. 3 relics should be more than enough to power strangler, and the need to always have it against snapcaster decks isn't too high as we are already favored against those decks, same thing with Jund (which we should be feasting on as it rises once again). I honestly think I'd go down to even 2 relics maindeck before I'd cut any of the other cards out, especially since I want to keep 4 paths so I wouldn't be losing out on too much exiling early in the game. 2 mind stones feel necessary, think of it as a relic that gives us ramp rather than interacts with the graveyard at a cost of 1 more CMC to cast, seems good. It enables us to ramp and put the pressure on the -should be- slower meta, and it also enables T3 damnation which is the nuts against decks like elves and merfolk and zoo.
The sideboard feels like it should have 17 slots, hell 20. The 2-ofs as it stands I feel need to be 2-ofs, because of the need to have them early and because drawing both copies in 1 game isn't bad at all. I really want a second surgical and a second stony in there. Maybe a fatal push in the side isn't necessary? We keep it in against most of the field so why would we need a third to bring in when we can't take enough cards out to make room? Wastes feels needed unless you are all but certain you won't be seeing a blood moon opponent, ghost quarter to swap out for cavern when cavern isn't needed. EE/ratchet as sweepers, fish and elves are still very much a thing, and ratchet is a catch-all we need. I had a very hard time taking ratchet out of the maindeck because of how versatile it is, and the need to have a catch-all that isn't anguished so it can easily remove blood moon, but ultimately I need to think of game 1 as trying to execute my deck's plan rather than commit to per-emptively stopping the opponent's. Games 2 and 3 are still very winnable thanks to the sideboard. A second anguish to bring in against infect and tron, mostly tron. It's also quite fine againt jund as that matchup is all about topdecking more removal/threats and whoever draws more durdle loses. A second CoBr to bring in against burn and infect, with it's synergy with Lingering Souls we definitely want to be able to bring in a second copy for dat value. But a second stony silence and second surgical should be in there. Stony is a card we want in an opening hand against tron or affinity, is 1 enough to draw it when we need it? Is two too much because of all the artifacts we ourselves run? And the second surgical to pull off the combo-wombo against tron and valakut, but do we really need two surgicals against any other matchups (it is still very very good against dredge, which isn't entirely gone with the latest ban but I also have literally never seen anyone at any local stores play dredge in a paper tournament).
Let me know what you think of the maindeck, and how you'd fill out the cramped sideboard. It's hard to speculate on where the meta of modern will go, but I think it's safe to say it will get slower and grindier, Jund and Tron will be increasing, as will blood moon decks.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR