I played the list at the top of this page again last night, moving 2 Liliana's to the sideboard and moving a Stubborn Denial to the main, dropping Liliana's Defeat, and adding a second Dismember. I went 1-2-DROP, beating R/G Ponza and losing to Jeskai and Merfolk. It was my first time playing against Merfolk, and I think I had the tools to win but didn't play them properly, which was also how my Jeskai match felt. In general, the 75 felt very strong, though I'm starting to think that Golgari Charm may just be a little too cute.
I'm opting not to run this list for the Classic this weekend, purely on the back of my lack of experience with it. There's a lot of complicated lines and I'm just not confident that I'm savvy enough with some of the more complicated matchups (notably, Jeskai) to want to bring it to a bigger tournament yet. I'm planning to play a more traditional 4-color Traverse list (Jund splashing white) for this weekend and then continue practicing with the BUG based list after that.
I'll be playtesting a 4c version with Snap tomorrow. I'll let you know how it goes. I'm going to try to not play any blue cantrips, I really don't like them. (And if I have to play them to make snap work, Id rather just stick with 5c)
This is what I plan on playing:
I am testing Golgari charm and really like it as a 1 of in many matchups.
Control - Leylines, Supreme Will
Mardu Pyromancer/Free win red - Rabblemasters/pyromancers and blood moon
Elves - Everything
Ad Naus - Leyline
For 1 sideboard slot it can give you an extra solid card in a lot of matches.
As humans gains some traction, I am considering putting 2 Grim Lavamancers into the sideboard. If you can land one early it seems like it would help shore up the matchup a lot and change it from 45/55 to 55/45 in our favor.
I'd love to hear about how grim does. It messes with Goyf and Traverse, but its interesting to note---Reid Duke is a huge advocate for no boardwipes and Grim Lavas instead. Outside of K-Command, you're not trying to two for one people.
The cards you're bringing in Grim for are against decks that lack the removal, or it's removal that doesn't hit a large shadow instead.
I've been thinking about replacing the 2 Radiant Flames in my Traverse sideboard with straight up Lightning Bolt because I'm starting to come to the conclusion that mana cost is more important than the sweeper effect. Against Humans, in particular, Thalia makes sweepers really hard for us to cast, and for the most part our creatures outclass theirs. I think I die to Mantis Rider out of Humans more than any other card in the deck, which is also a card that Bolt interacts favorably with. Against go-wide decks that don't run Thalia (Affinity, Elves, Merfolk) sweepers definitely seem better, but those decks aren't super popular right now and Affinity (in particular) is already a pretty good matchup for Traverse builds.
To comment on the ongoing discussion, Grim Lavamancer does sound worth trying for humans specifically. Interesting idea. It's not the card I would prefer to have in most other matchups where it comes it, but it still seem good in those spots (Affinity, burn, elves, etc). My main beef is probably that it doesn't do much against dredge, whereas Radiant Flames is pretty good there.
An interesting question: I was always believing the Grixis player is favoured because of Delve creatures vs Goyfs when it comes to killing creatures and the Snapcaster/K-Command package. But I find myself more often on the winning side than not.
Preboard Traverse Shadow has Liliana of the Veil and Traverse, which are imo mirrorbreakers. Postboard the matchup doesn't get much worse with Souls and Ranger.
@Spooly Enjoyed the write-up, have you played the list you posted against Grixis Shadow very much? More than any other, that's the matchup that's keeping me on Liliana of the Veil right now.
@Spooly Enjoyed the write-up, have you played the list you posted against Grixis Shadow very much? More than any other, that's the matchup that's keeping me on Liliana of the Veil right now.
I've played against it some, but not a ton. It is giving up some percentage points against them due to not having LotV, but I don't think it makes the matchup bad. Lingering Souls is still king postboard, and they're configuring their deck to be less and less grindy these days, making game 1 in particular much mroe winnable. But if you expect a lot of pseudo-mirrors, I'd definitely keep 2 LotV in the 75. I'm gunning more for the big mana decks.
Fair enough, I would expect your list to do very well against Tron/Scapeshift. After waffling on 4 vs 5 colors all week, I played this last night to a 4-0 finish:
I beat Junk Reanimator, U/W Control, Pyro Prison, and Scapeshift. The deck was like a freight train, and despite how simple the sideboard is I felt like I had a lot of options in each matchup and was very happy with my post-board configurations. I was surprised by how much I liked Fulminator, this deck already has so much resource denial that he just really tips the scales and makes it almost impossible for your opponent to catch up when you get ahead. At this point, this is the list I'm planning to play on Sunday, and I'm not expecting that to change.
Fair enough, I would expect your list to do very well against Tron/Scapeshift. After waffling on 4 vs 5 colors all week, I played this last night to a 4-0 finish:
I beat Junk Reanimator, U/W Control, Pyro Prison, and Scapeshift. The deck was like a freight train, and despite how simple the sideboard is I felt like I had a lot of options in each matchup and was very happy with my post-board configurations. I was surprised by how much I liked Fulminator, this deck already has so much resource denial that he just really tips the scales and makes it almost impossible for your opponent to catch up when you get ahead. At this point, this is the list I'm planning to play on Sunday, and I'm not expecting that to change.
Pretty much what I was running minus the bolt. Hazoret is so I don't have 4 dead cards if shrine blows up
So I've been trying really hard to figure out a way to be 4 color and, by extension, utilize Snapcaster Mage in the deck.
Spooly and I agreed that our least favorite part of Grixis are the blue cantrips. They are a necessary evil but can definitely cause the deck to 'spin its wheels' too much and lead to losing. After the initial testing of just throwing Snap into the Traverse deck, it unfortunately felt like it would be necessary to play some blue cantrips so that Snap would have enough proactive targets when you didn't have a hand disruption spell to flashback.
So I set off on trying to figure out how to solve this issue. It took a long time and the inspiration actually came from looking at Legacy Grixis Delver lists. I know that the formats are not the same, but I realized that I had forgotten how good the spell Lightning Bolt is. I'm not sure this is actually better than what we are already doing, but it for sure hasn't felt like a downgrade in my testing so far, so I think I might be on to something. Instead of trying to turn into an Abzan deck with Lingering Souls in the side, I think we can instead be more like a tempo deck and disrupt and clock them before they stabilize.
This is the OUTLINE for the deck. The deck will likely need some tuning, but it has shown some serious legs in testing. It just embraces the fact that Traverse is more aggressive and sleek than Grixis. I really feel like we have forgotten the power of Lightning Bolt both as removal spell (Mantis Rider and Spell Queller) and as another way shut the door on our opponent before they can stabilize. The Bolts give more targets for Snapcaster Mage and can turn him into a real threat.
So I've been trying really hard to figure out a way to be 4 color and, by extension, utilize Snapcaster Mage in the deck.
Spooly and I agreed that our least favorite part of Grixis are the blue cantrips. They are a necessary evil but can definitely cause the deck to 'spin its wheels' too much and lead to losing. After the initial testing of just throwing Snap into the Traverse deck, it unfortunately felt like it would be necessary to play some blue cantrips so that Snap would have enough proactive targets when you didn't have a hand disruption spell to flashback.
I drew this conclusion when I tried Snapcaster as well.
So I set off on trying to figure out how to solve this issue. It took a long time and the inspiration actually came from looking at Legacy Grixis Delver lists. I know that the formats are not the same, but I realized that I had forgotten how good the spell Lightning Bolt is. I'm not sure this is actually better than what we are already doing, but it for sure hasn't felt like a downgrade in my testing so far, so I think I might be on to something. Instead of trying to turn into an Abzan deck with Lingering Souls in the side, I think we can instead be more like a tempo deck and disrupt and clock them before they stabilize.
This is the OUTLINE for the deck. The deck will likely need some tuning, but it has shown some serious legs in testing. It just embraces the fact that Traverse is more aggressive and sleek than Grixis. I really feel like we have forgotten the power of Lightning Bolt both as removal spell (Mantis Rider and Spell Queller) and as another way shut the door on our opponent before they can stabilize. The Bolts give more targets for Snapcaster Mage and can turn him into a real threat.
<snip>
I have a feeling that you'll want to pull back a bit on snap and bolt after testing this (-1 and -2 respectively), but this is exactly the sort of shell you should test first to really see how good the idea is.
Hmm. In the games I've played so far, drawing one random Bolt against the non-creature decks is pretty mediocre, but drawing a second one (or a snap) it easily takes a whole turn off the clock and then its great.
I wanted start here so I could see the cards enough in testing so I could actually evaluate them, but just a couple bolts and Snaps sounds like a normal build that is hedged towards humans and little creature decks. This many bolts and snaps makes the reach a reliable strategy for the deck to aim towards. Even in my testing against UWR control, snap/bolt has been quite strong to keep applying pressure, especially after they Supreme Verdict.
I might be too optimistic after the high of rediscovering bolt though, so you may be right in the end.
What would you replace them with in the maindeck with your changes? The 4th Inquisition, move a stubborn to the main, and add the first Grim Flayer?
What would you replace them with in the maindeck with your changes? The 4th Inquisition, move a stubborn to the main, and add the first Grim Flayer?
Bingo
So uh... you gonna try out this version? ;D
Maybe! I'm in a lull right now, at least until after the PT. Though I was tossing around the idea of dropping white again today, and instead of trying to make up for the loss of Lingering Souls in grindy matchups, just putting the effort elsewhere in the metagame.
I'm not sure that you can afford to ignore the grindy matchups at this point, Snapcaster Mage seems pretty intent on sticking around for now. Depending on what they unban after the PT, something like BBE could really present the need to be able to play a longer game. After playing with and without Snapcaster over the last couple weeks, I'm really not convinced that we need him. He's a fantastic card, but I think that Grim Flayer serves a lot of the same purposes in Traverse Shadow while also being a better workhorse in glueing the deck together. I will say that I played a single Lightning Bolt at the classic this past weekend and would probably drop my 4th Fatal Push for a second one, because it turns out that Lightning Bolt is still a fantastic Magic card.
It's not snapcaster mage that I'm worried about in grindy matchups. The 2/1 body represents < 1/2 of a card against us most of the time. (Snapcaster's value is as a demonic tutor, not as a two for one). The problems are typically stuff like planeswalkers, supreme verdict (or other wraths), commands of some sort (cryptic, kolaghan's, whatever), lingering souls, kitchen finks, etc. Or just a pile of burn + hard to block creatures / manlands.
I'm not even sure Lingering Souls is the best way to try to fight the UWR decks, for example. Going long, they can burn us out too easy.
Snap/Bolt plan seems like a reasonable way to deal with a lot of the problems you just listed. Bolts can help a lot with planeswalkers, end step deploying Snap after they use a sweeper, Snap/Stub for the expensive Commands. I haven't played against many kitchen finks lately. Hopefully you can either punish them or close out the game before they start activating Colonnades.
Like I said, don't turn into an Abzan deck and make the game go long. Close the game while disrupting their ability to stabilize.
Hey guys, I just played Jund DS (Splashing white in the board) for the first time a few nights ago. I loved it and I will be continuing to play it.
How do you guys feel about a 1-of Ghor-Clan Rampager in the main? I was initially planning on running 1, but noticed no other lists were running any so I didn't. But there were multiple times when I wanted to traverse for it and couldn't because it wasn't in my deck.
What do you guys think about it? Also, how do you feel about Golgari Charm? I ran 1 in my board and I boarded it in for almost all my matches.
Matches:
Free win red (2-1)
GR Ponza (2-0)
Eldrazi Tron (0-2)
Esper Tokens (1-1-1)
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I'm opting not to run this list for the Classic this weekend, purely on the back of my lack of experience with it. There's a lot of complicated lines and I'm just not confident that I'm savvy enough with some of the more complicated matchups (notably, Jeskai) to want to bring it to a bigger tournament yet. I'm planning to play a more traditional 4-color Traverse list (Jund splashing white) for this weekend and then continue practicing with the BUG based list after that.
This is what I plan on playing:
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Grim Flayer
1 Snapcaster Mage
4 Thoughtseize
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Stubborn Denial
3 Fatal Push
2 Tarfire
2 Dismember
2 Temur Battle Rage
1 Kolaghan's Command
1 Abrupt Decay
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Mishra's Bauble
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Bloodstained Mire
3 Polluted Delta
2 Misty Rainforest
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Watery Grave
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Blood Crypt
1 Swamp
3 Stubborn Denial
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Kolaghan's Command
3 Snapcaster Mage
1 Izzet Staticaster
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Ceremonious Rejection
1 Golgari Charm
Control - Leylines, Supreme Will
Mardu Pyromancer/Free win red - Rabblemasters/pyromancers and blood moon
Elves - Everything
Ad Naus - Leyline
For 1 sideboard slot it can give you an extra solid card in a lot of matches.
As humans gains some traction, I am considering putting 2 Grim Lavamancers into the sideboard. If you can land one early it seems like it would help shore up the matchup a lot and change it from 45/55 to 55/45 in our favor.
The cards you're bringing in Grim for are against decks that lack the removal, or it's removal that doesn't hit a large shadow instead.
Reddit link: https://www.reddit.com/r/ModernMagic/comments/7sq716/running_away_from_the_zoo_and_back_into_the/
To comment on the ongoing discussion, Grim Lavamancer does sound worth trying for humans specifically. Interesting idea. It's not the card I would prefer to have in most other matchups where it comes it, but it still seem good in those spots (Affinity, burn, elves, etc). My main beef is probably that it doesn't do much against dredge, whereas Radiant Flames is pretty good there.
Bant Eldrazi
UW Control
U Merfolk
Legacy
Merfolk
UR Delver
Preboard Traverse Shadow has Liliana of the Veil and Traverse, which are imo mirrorbreakers. Postboard the matchup doesn't get much worse with Souls and Ranger.
I've played against it some, but not a ton. It is giving up some percentage points against them due to not having LotV, but I don't think it makes the matchup bad. Lingering Souls is still king postboard, and they're configuring their deck to be less and less grindy these days, making game 1 in particular much mroe winnable. But if you expect a lot of pseudo-mirrors, I'd definitely keep 2 LotV in the 75. I'm gunning more for the big mana decks.
1x Blood Crypt
4x Bloodstained Mire
1x Forest
1x Godless Shrine
2x Overgrown Tomb
3x Polluted Delta
1x Stomping Ground
1x Swamp
4x Verdant Catacombs
Artifact (4)
4x Mishra's Bauble
Instant (10)
1x Abrupt Decay
4x Fatal Push
1x Lightning Bolt
2x Temur Battle Rage
2x Terminate
4x Death's Shadow
2x Grim Flayer
4x Street Wraith
4x Tarmogoyf
Planeswalker (2)
2x Liliana of the Veil
Sorcery (12)
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Thoughtseize
4x Traverse the Ulvenwald
2x Ancient Grudge
3x Collective Brutality
3x Fulminator Mage
1x Hazoret the Fervent
1x Liliana, the Last Hope
3x Lingering Souls
2x Surgical Extraction
I beat Junk Reanimator, U/W Control, Pyro Prison, and Scapeshift. The deck was like a freight train, and despite how simple the sideboard is I felt like I had a lot of options in each matchup and was very happy with my post-board configurations. I was surprised by how much I liked Fulminator, this deck already has so much resource denial that he just really tips the scales and makes it almost impossible for your opponent to catch up when you get ahead. At this point, this is the list I'm planning to play on Sunday, and I'm not expecting that to change.
Pretty much what I was running minus the bolt. Hazoret is so I don't have 4 dead cards if shrine blows up
Spooly and I agreed that our least favorite part of Grixis are the blue cantrips. They are a necessary evil but can definitely cause the deck to 'spin its wheels' too much and lead to losing. After the initial testing of just throwing Snap into the Traverse deck, it unfortunately felt like it would be necessary to play some blue cantrips so that Snap would have enough proactive targets when you didn't have a hand disruption spell to flashback.
So I set off on trying to figure out how to solve this issue. It took a long time and the inspiration actually came from looking at Legacy Grixis Delver lists. I know that the formats are not the same, but I realized that I had forgotten how good the spell Lightning Bolt is. I'm not sure this is actually better than what we are already doing, but it for sure hasn't felt like a downgrade in my testing so far, so I think I might be on to something. Instead of trying to turn into an Abzan deck with Lingering Souls in the side, I think we can instead be more like a tempo deck and disrupt and clock them before they stabilize.
This is the OUTLINE for the deck. The deck will likely need some tuning, but it has shown some serious legs in testing. It just embraces the fact that Traverse is more aggressive and sleek than Grixis. I really feel like we have forgotten the power of Lightning Bolt both as removal spell (Mantis Rider and Spell Queller) and as another way shut the door on our opponent before they can stabilize. The Bolts give more targets for Snapcaster Mage and can turn him into a real threat.
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Snapcaster Mage
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Mishra's Bauble
4 Street Wraith
4 Thoughtseize
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Stubborn Denial
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Fatal Push
2 Dismember
2 Temur Battle Rage
3 Bloodstained Mire
3 Polluted Delta
2 Misty Rainforest
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Watery Grave
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Blood Crypt
1 Swamp
3 Stubborn Denial
3 Kolaghan's Command
2 Ceremonious Rejection
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Disdainful Stroke
1 Snapcaster Mage
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Golgari Charm
1 Maelstrom Pulse
I drew this conclusion when I tried Snapcaster as well.
I have a feeling that you'll want to pull back a bit on snap and bolt after testing this (-1 and -2 respectively), but this is exactly the sort of shell you should test first to really see how good the idea is.
I wanted start here so I could see the cards enough in testing so I could actually evaluate them, but just a couple bolts and Snaps sounds like a normal build that is hedged towards humans and little creature decks. This many bolts and snaps makes the reach a reliable strategy for the deck to aim towards. Even in my testing against UWR control, snap/bolt has been quite strong to keep applying pressure, especially after they Supreme Verdict.
I might be too optimistic after the high of rediscovering bolt though, so you may be right in the end.
What would you replace them with in the maindeck with your changes? The 4th Inquisition, move a stubborn to the main, and add the first Grim Flayer?
So uh... you gonna try out this version? ;D
Bingo
Maybe! I'm in a lull right now, at least until after the PT. Though I was tossing around the idea of dropping white again today, and instead of trying to make up for the loss of Lingering Souls in grindy matchups, just putting the effort elsewhere in the metagame.
I'm not even sure Lingering Souls is the best way to try to fight the UWR decks, for example. Going long, they can burn us out too easy.
Like I said, don't turn into an Abzan deck and make the game go long. Close the game while disrupting their ability to stabilize.
How do you guys feel about a 1-of Ghor-Clan Rampager in the main? I was initially planning on running 1, but noticed no other lists were running any so I didn't. But there were multiple times when I wanted to traverse for it and couldn't because it wasn't in my deck.
What do you guys think about it? Also, how do you feel about Golgari Charm? I ran 1 in my board and I boarded it in for almost all my matches.
Matches:
Free win red (2-1)
GR Ponza (2-0)
Eldrazi Tron (0-2)
Esper Tokens (1-1-1)