I was mistaken about the reference because he was indeed discussing his GDS sideboard when suggesting Spellskite. But also has an article critiquing Peter Holman's winning list from a couple months back, here. It's interesting how often he admits that Traverse is actually better off than GDS against certain opponents.
I've been really loving Grim Flayer lately. Both as an extra body but also because of his ability. Grim Flayer was the reason I won three matches this morning, one against 8-Whack, one against Dredge and the other against Spirits. In each match, he was an additional relevant threat and twice his surveil ability played in a game win.
I've been coming around on LOTV again, currently trying two in my list. So far she's been stuck in my hand during a couple games, but I won those anyway.
Yeah, Flayer is definitely an asset in matchups where you rely heavily on finding key sideboard cards. I'd run two if I could but I don't see what I'd cut for the second copy.
I'm very surprised with Cindervines
I will try it in my current two decks DS Jund in Modern and AggroLoam in Legacy
Probably two of them in the main (in both cases).
I'm very surprised with Cindervines
I will try it in my current two decks DS Jund in Modern and AggroLoam in Legacy
Probably two of them in the main (in both cases).
I'm very surprised with Cindervines
I will try it in my current two decks DS Jund in Modern and AggroLoam in Legacy
Probably two of them in the main (in both cases).
Against what do you bring it in?
Obviously UR phoenix but then? Uw Control?
Since the KCI ban, not sure it's good enaugh; (maybe im wrong)
Two main deck definitely seems odd for Cindervines. I'm not sure it does much of anything against dredge, spirits, GDS, humans, and it's likely too slow against tron or UW. But I hope I'm wrong. It'd be nice to have a enchantment card type as a staple to make delirium and Tarmogoyf better off.
Cindervines was already just a "maybe" with KCI in the format, without it I think there are several other options that line up better against the format.
How have you guys been adjusting to the new configurations of Burn? My initial reaction was just to add a third Brutality in the sideboard, but that's really only good against Burn. I've been considering changing the third Brutality to either a super-aggressive hate card like Life Goes On or Feed the Clan that really hamstrings them, or something less powerful but more widely applicable like Duress. I haven't had much time to actually playtest lately, so I'm not sure how necessary the third anti-Burn card is.
Is something like Dragon's Blood a reasonable option against them? Collective Brutality could also be useful if the Vannifar deck starts picking up steam. They typically play chord, path, maybe more spells post board.
Personally I have only played one match against the new spectacle burn. I won g1 with classic Shadow > TBR. Then game two he scoops after I turn 1 Thoughtseize him and see he kept a 6 with 4 lands, two spectacle cards, and no enablers. Weird keep
I hope people keep playing new fringe decks hoping to crack the next flavor of the month because I feel pretty confident against most things. I've been doing fairly well in leagues lately, losing only to UW and Jund. I randomly lost a match to Titan shift because I miscalculated his lands. I let him resolve a hard cast Search for tomorrow when he already had a Valakut on the table. It made his 6th mountain and he popped my 3/3 Shadow when I had lethal on board next turn. I was holding Delay in hand ut didn't cast it on his SFT because I miscounted the mountains. It was game 3 of the match
I assume you mean Dragon's Claw? Maybe if they're all over the place, but I'd still rather play something a bit more widely applicable or at least instant-speed.
It looks like very aggressive and fast. full of 1CC value creatures. and play the DS life plan not only with Dismember but also with Mutagenic Growth it can be good at G1, but the only defense in the main is the removal and the black discard suite
Yeah, Suicide Zoo has been around since before DSJ as far as I'm aware. It can be very explosive but lacks disruption and doesn't deal with it very well from the other side of the table either.
If you really need to win on turn 3 at the expense of consistency, it's a great option. Fun to play too, but it can't hold a candle to GDS and Traverse across the board as far as I'm concerned.
I don't think the Shadow Zoo list is better positioned against even the linear decks (such Tron, Infect, or Storm) than we are as Traverse players. While Zoo is faster than us, they lack interaction so there's the chance a linear deck will just out-goldfish them. Whereas I personally feel like I'm currently piloting the absolute best deck in the format against fully linear opponents. The games I play against Ad Naseum, Amulet Titan, or even Hollow One & Dredge..are hilarious. Even Phoenix, Affinity & Scales are usually a blowout in my favor.
Then you have mid-range creature decks like Vizier Combo, Humans, Spirits - all of which I'd say are medium if not slightly unfavorable.
And lastly we have the highly interactive decks; our cryptonite. If we had just a bit more ways to protect our threats we could potentially shore up these matches and consider ourselves tier 1.
I've been watching a few of the recent Dylan Hovey streams lately and he plays a mean traverse shadow list with 3x Tarfire. I personally don't agree with running only 1 basic (he has no forest) but the rest of his list has some serious gas.
Ah yeah, but that's 2 months old.. I'd hardly call that recent. I think the metagame's changed a little bit since then.. Still, it might hold up nicely. I agree on the Forest though, that's risky.
I remember that list, I'm pretty sure the lack of a basic Forest did come up a couple times and cost him a few games, but I don't know that it was the deciding factor in any of his matches.
I had some success a couple months ago on Grixis Shadow playing Surgical Extractions in the main deck when Dredge first rose to prominence, and I've been brainstorming some Jund lists doing the same. This is what I'm interested in trying as a starting point:
My hope was to maintain the matchups where I think we're definitely favored (Tron, Valakut, Amulet Titan, Izzet Phoenix) while teasing up some of the more even matchups to be favored (Humans, Spirits, Mono R Phoenix, Burn, Hardened Scales). My last couple cards are aimed specifically at improving the Grixis Shadow matchup, which has gotten more challenging as they've adjusted to better compensate for the mirror. I'm also hedging a bit against artifacts as a concession to some of the things people are experimenting with, namely 4c Whir, the new eggs-style deck running Grinding Station, and the return of traditional Affinity with Experimental Frenzy.
In the Hovey streams he doesn't play against any GDS opponents which is the biggest factor in the videos feeling out-of-touch with the current meta game. The lines of play are pretty relevant still and he doesn't play against any decks that are now obsolete or non-existent. I like watching these game play videos because of the misplays he makes. It helps me learn from them. And also the deck construction issues, like watching how he flops because of no basic forest, or how often Tarfire helps. It's inspired me to try 3x in my main deck, and certainly never play without the basic forest.
One thing I feel is that it's hard to go all-in on Tarfire when you're also running 3x stub in the main deck. I know I've ranted quite a bit these last few pages about the value of stub but I'm currently trying 3x Tarfire and no stubs, with 2x Grim Flayer. Really trying to go all in on the aggro plan. I haven't had a chance to test against burn with my new configuration yet. I am happy to report that I won two matches last night, Jund 2-0 and UW 2-0
-EDIT-
Defish, I'm super interested in your main board surgical. Please report back with how it goes
I could not be more sold on Tarire over Bolt in Traverse, it's just so effective at greasing the wheels while also being a removal spell. It's funny that you're less enthusiastic about Stubborn Denial, because I think it's better now than it's been in the last several months.
I was only able to play two matches last night, and ended up beating the Enduring Ideal deck and Titanshift. I drew both Surgicals against Enduring Ideal and they were better than the removal spells they replaced. Moreso than the actual card's effect, it was super helpful to be able to look through my opponent's deck so that I could be better informed about how to sideboard, given that it's a more unusual strategy. Against Titanshift I would have Surgicaled a Valakut in game 1 if I wasn't winning on that turn, which was pretty exciting. I ended up modifying my cantrip suite a bit, and have been pretty happy with it so far:
I lifted the cantrip/land configuration from a guy named Stephen Snelson, who consistently puts up results in SCG Classics with a similar build. I have no expectation that Font of Agonies will turn out to be amazing, but with the extra Phyrexian spells I thought if there was ever going to be a time, this would be it. I'm also more willing to run narrow cards like that because of the presence of Faithless Looting and Liliana.
This is all still an incredibly small sample size, but so far my optimism is high!
Edit - Finished the league 3-2 overall. My last three matches were against Tron (2-1), BG Rock (1-2), and a neat Jund (0-2) list running Bedlam Reveler and Grim Flayer instead of BBE and Dark Confidant. Font of Agonies was amusing, but ultimately I'm just going to drop it for a 4th Fatal Push. Both fair matchups were close enough that I feel like they're at least even, and I likely would have won game 3 against BG but I was stuck on 2 lands with only 33 cards left in the deck. I'm interested in replacing my third Anger of the Gods with a Liliana, the Last Hope, which will probably make my fair matchups about as good as they can reasonably be.
First I must clarify that the Dredge match was not a legitimate loss. I had him dead on board next turn, and his final draw step he dredges into a Creeping chill AND Conflagrate. Responding to the chill trigger, I discard Faerie Macabre but misclick and exile the chill and a Loam. He wins during main phase with Conflagrate X=4. I was at 2 life with Shadow on board and TBR up. Needless to say, I missed my stubs in this match but I should've won anyway.
The AN match is definitely where I needed the stub the most. I durdled a bit in game one but had lethal on board the turn before he killed me with the Lightning combo. Next game he has turn 0 Leyline of Sanctity and even then I beat through to get him low. I stupidly waste my Reclamation Sage on his Leyline then he follows up next turn with an Unlife. I would have killed him that turn if I just saved my Sage. No idea how game 3 would've gone but I definitely longed for counter magic. I anticipate Amulet would be a similar opponent.
I also played a few pick up matches the night before.
BG Rock 2-1
Bogles 1-2
Dredge 2-0
The bogles deck is something I couldn't have been less prepared for. No LOTV, no EE, nothing. But being an aggro deck it's only a matter of sequencing the turns. It's entirely possible to just Shadow-TBR them out, so long as they don't stick a life link.
Hey everyone, i play currently a pretty stock list. can't post a list right now because i'm on my phone. may will edit it later, sorry for that.
but my question is: would you swap a faithless looting in for may one bubble?
very torn about that, cause i don't want it in my opener but guess its good in the lategame to drop some dead cards.
Like wraith if your life total is to low or anything like that.
What is your suggestion?
I've been really loving Grim Flayer lately. Both as an extra body but also because of his ability. Grim Flayer was the reason I won three matches this morning, one against 8-Whack, one against Dredge and the other against Spirits. In each match, he was an additional relevant threat and twice his surveil ability played in a game win.
I've been coming around on LOTV again, currently trying two in my list. So far she's been stuck in my hand during a couple games, but I won those anyway.
Draft My Cube!
Abzan Traverse / Traverse Shadow / UR Kiki
I will try it in my current two decks DS Jund in Modern and AggroLoam in Legacy
Probably two of them in the main (in both cases).
Against what do you bring it in?
Obviously UR phoenix but then? Uw Control?
Since the KCI ban, not sure it's good enaugh; (maybe im wrong)
BGUSultai Shadow
BURGrixis Shadow
BGUSultai midrange
BRWMardu Pyromancer
BGRJund
Report back to us with how it goes for you
Draft My Cube!
How have you guys been adjusting to the new configurations of Burn? My initial reaction was just to add a third Brutality in the sideboard, but that's really only good against Burn. I've been considering changing the third Brutality to either a super-aggressive hate card like Life Goes On or Feed the Clan that really hamstrings them, or something less powerful but more widely applicable like Duress. I haven't had much time to actually playtest lately, so I'm not sure how necessary the third anti-Burn card is.
Personally I have only played one match against the new spectacle burn. I won g1 with classic Shadow > TBR. Then game two he scoops after I turn 1 Thoughtseize him and see he kept a 6 with 4 lands, two spectacle cards, and no enablers. Weird keep
I hope people keep playing new fringe decks hoping to crack the next flavor of the month because I feel pretty confident against most things. I've been doing fairly well in leagues lately, losing only to UW and Jund. I randomly lost a match to Titan shift because I miscalculated his lands. I let him resolve a hard cast Search for tomorrow when he already had a Valakut on the table. It made his 6th mountain and he popped my 3/3 Shadow when I had lethal on board next turn. I was holding Delay in hand ut didn't cast it on his SFT because I miscounted the mountains. It was game 3 of the match
Draft My Cube!
Abzan Traverse / Traverse Shadow / UR Kiki
https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=21139&d=340870&f=MO
It looks like very aggressive and fast. full of 1CC value creatures. and play the DS life plan not only with Dismember but also with Mutagenic Growth it can be good at G1, but the only defense in the main is the removal and the black discard suite
Note: Includes a delve option with the Hooting Mandrills in the SB
If you really need to win on turn 3 at the expense of consistency, it's a great option. Fun to play too, but it can't hold a candle to GDS and Traverse across the board as far as I'm concerned.
Abzan Traverse / Traverse Shadow / UR Kiki
Then you have mid-range creature decks like Vizier Combo, Humans, Spirits - all of which I'd say are medium if not slightly unfavorable.
And lastly we have the highly interactive decks; our cryptonite. If we had just a bit more ways to protect our threats we could potentially shore up these matches and consider ourselves tier 1.
I've been watching a few of the recent Dylan Hovey streams lately and he plays a mean traverse shadow list with 3x Tarfire. I personally don't agree with running only 1 basic (he has no forest) but the rest of his list has some serious gas.
Draft My Cube!
Abzan Traverse / Traverse Shadow / UR Kiki
According to this link:
https://girltattoos.site/videovines/lH7XzFeaG5Y/modern-4-color-shadow-12172018
(including video)
1 Blood Crypt
4 Bloodstained Mire
1 Breeding Pool
4 Death's Shadow
2 Dismember
3 Tarfire
2 Fatal Push
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
4 Mishra's Bauble
1 Overgrown Tomb
4 Polluted Delta
1 Stomping Ground
4 Street Wraith
3 Stubborn Denial
1 Swamp
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Temur Battle Rage
4 Thoughtseize
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Watery Grave
SB:
2 Kolaghan's Command
2 Assassin's Trophy
2 Collective Brutality
2 Disdainful Stroke
1 Temur Battle Rage
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Fatal Push
1 Stubborn Denial
Abzan Traverse / Traverse Shadow / UR Kiki
I had some success a couple months ago on Grixis Shadow playing Surgical Extractions in the main deck when Dredge first rose to prominence, and I've been brainstorming some Jund lists doing the same. This is what I'm interested in trying as a starting point:
1x Blood Crypt
4x Bloodstained Mire
1x Forest
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Stomping Ground
1x Swamp
4x Verdant Catacombs
4x Wooded Foothills
Creature (12)
4x Death's Shadow
4x Street Wraith
4x Tarmogoyf
2x Assassin's Trophy
3x Fatal Push
2x Surgical Extraction
2x Tarfire
2x Temur Battle Rage
Sorcery (12)
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Thoughtseize
4x Traverse the Ulvenwald
Artifact (4)
4x Mishra's Bauble
Planeswalker (3)
3x Liliana of the Veil
1x Ancient Grudge
3x Anger of the Gods
1x Assassin's Trophy
1x Choke
3x Collective Brutality
3x Fulminator Mage
2x Kolaghan's Command
1x Surgical Extraction
My hope was to maintain the matchups where I think we're definitely favored (Tron, Valakut, Amulet Titan, Izzet Phoenix) while teasing up some of the more even matchups to be favored (Humans, Spirits, Mono R Phoenix, Burn, Hardened Scales). My last couple cards are aimed specifically at improving the Grixis Shadow matchup, which has gotten more challenging as they've adjusted to better compensate for the mirror. I'm also hedging a bit against artifacts as a concession to some of the things people are experimenting with, namely 4c Whir, the new eggs-style deck running Grinding Station, and the return of traditional Affinity with Experimental Frenzy.
One thing I feel is that it's hard to go all-in on Tarfire when you're also running 3x stub in the main deck. I know I've ranted quite a bit these last few pages about the value of stub but I'm currently trying 3x Tarfire and no stubs, with 2x Grim Flayer. Really trying to go all in on the aggro plan. I haven't had a chance to test against burn with my new configuration yet. I am happy to report that I won two matches last night, Jund 2-0 and UW 2-0
-EDIT-
Defish, I'm super interested in your main board surgical. Please report back with how it goes
Draft My Cube!
I was only able to play two matches last night, and ended up beating the Enduring Ideal deck and Titanshift. I drew both Surgicals against Enduring Ideal and they were better than the removal spells they replaced. Moreso than the actual card's effect, it was super helpful to be able to look through my opponent's deck so that I could be better informed about how to sideboard, given that it's a more unusual strategy. Against Titanshift I would have Surgicaled a Valakut in game 1 if I wasn't winning on that turn, which was pretty exciting. I ended up modifying my cantrip suite a bit, and have been pretty happy with it so far:
2x Blood Crypt
4x Bloodstained Mire
1x Forest
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Stomping Ground
1x Swamp
4x Verdant Catacombs
2x Wooded Foothills
Creature (12)
4x Death's Shadow
4x Street Wraith
4x Tarmogoyf
2x Assassin's Trophy
3x Fatal Push
2x Surgical Extraction
2x Tarfire
2x Temur Battle Rage
Sorcery (13)
2x Faithless Looting
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
4x Thoughtseize
3x Traverse the Ulvenwald
Artifact (4)
4x Mishra's Bauble
Enchantment (1)
1x Font of Agonies
2x Liliana of the Veil
1x Ancient Grudge
3x Anger of the Gods
1x Assassin's Trophy
1x Bedlam Reveler
3x Collective Brutality
3x Fulminator Mage
2x Kolaghan's Command
1x Surgical Extraction
I lifted the cantrip/land configuration from a guy named Stephen Snelson, who consistently puts up results in SCG Classics with a similar build. I have no expectation that Font of Agonies will turn out to be amazing, but with the extra Phyrexian spells I thought if there was ever going to be a time, this would be it. I'm also more willing to run narrow cards like that because of the presence of Faithless Looting and Liliana.
This is all still an incredibly small sample size, but so far my optimism is high!
Edit - Finished the league 3-2 overall. My last three matches were against Tron (2-1), BG Rock (1-2), and a neat Jund (0-2) list running Bedlam Reveler and Grim Flayer instead of BBE and Dark Confidant. Font of Agonies was amusing, but ultimately I'm just going to drop it for a 4th Fatal Push. Both fair matchups were close enough that I feel like they're at least even, and I likely would have won game 3 against BG but I was stuck on 2 lands with only 33 cards left in the deck. I'm interested in replacing my third Anger of the Gods with a Liliana, the Last Hope, which will probably make my fair matchups about as good as they can reasonably be.
Ad Naseum 0-2
Dredge 1-2
Burn 2-1
Jund 2-1
Jund 2-0
First I must clarify that the Dredge match was not a legitimate loss. I had him dead on board next turn, and his final draw step he dredges into a Creeping chill AND Conflagrate. Responding to the chill trigger, I discard Faerie Macabre but misclick and exile the chill and a Loam. He wins during main phase with Conflagrate X=4. I was at 2 life with Shadow on board and TBR up. Needless to say, I missed my stubs in this match but I should've won anyway.
The AN match is definitely where I needed the stub the most. I durdled a bit in game one but had lethal on board the turn before he killed me with the Lightning combo. Next game he has turn 0 Leyline of Sanctity and even then I beat through to get him low. I stupidly waste my Reclamation Sage on his Leyline then he follows up next turn with an Unlife. I would have killed him that turn if I just saved my Sage. No idea how game 3 would've gone but I definitely longed for counter magic. I anticipate Amulet would be a similar opponent.
I also played a few pick up matches the night before.
BG Rock 2-1
Bogles 1-2
Dredge 2-0
The bogles deck is something I couldn't have been less prepared for. No LOTV, no EE, nothing. But being an aggro deck it's only a matter of sequencing the turns. It's entirely possible to just Shadow-TBR them out, so long as they don't stick a life link.
For reference, here is the list I've been using:
4 Death's Shadow
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Street Wraith
3 Grim flayer
1 Shriekmaw
1 Ghor-Clan Rampager
1 Architects of Will
Spells (25)
4 Mishra's Bauble
4 Thoughtseize
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Traverse the Ulvenwald
3 Incubation // Incongruity
3 Tarfire
1 Temur Battle Rage
1 Fatal push
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Dismember
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Bloodstained Mire
2 Polluted Delta
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Watery Grave
1 Blood Crypt
1 Stomping ground
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Legion Loyalist
1 Grim Lavamancer
1 Reclamation Sage
3 Faerie Macabre
1 Scavenging Ooze
3 Fulminator Mage
2 Collective Brutality
1 Liliana, the Last hope
1 Hazoret, the Fervant
1 Fatal push
Draft My Cube!
but my question is: would you swap a faithless looting in for may one bubble?
very torn about that, cause i don't want it in my opener but guess its good in the lategame to drop some dead cards.
Like wraith if your life total is to low or anything like that.
What is your suggestion?
Abzan Traverse / Traverse Shadow / UR Kiki