Certainly an interesting and creative tech choice, I like it a lot. Personally if I was going after their lands I'd Spreading Seas them... or, you know, whatever the black card for that is (has been brought up before). I still think I'll wait for the meta to adjust and police itself at least a little bit but I imagine Affinity and Infect will be more problematic, in that order, so I'm dusting off my set of Disfigures for sideboarding purposes. Anyway, I digress. Painter's Servant seems a very cool way to tackle the Eldrazi problem.
The cards you may be thinking of are Evil Presence and Contaminated Ground. I've been playing around with them in an MBC Devotion deck prior to the recent Pro Tour. I haven't had much chance to test against the current colorless Eldrazi builds, but I used them to nasty effect against the Black Eldrazi decks, typically losing to either mana screw or mana flood. Otherwise, life was pretty good. I have no doubt that 8Rack can be tweaked to take advantage of this, as they also manage to hit the Wastes that Blood Moon misses.
One thing painter's servant does that contaminated ground doesn't is stop mimics, aggressors, and that sort of "colorless" triggers. I would expect eldrazi to start running a lot of gut shot edit*so gut shot doesn't kill servant*. Turns out servant helps a little bit with tron, shutting down eye of ugin and ancient stirrings. I got hammered by RG tron this AM, then beat up jund for a little saving grace.
Such a neysayer to pack rat, it's truly a great card.
Eldrazi is primarily a creature deck, they will struggle vs e.bridge, REALLY struggle, almost guaranteed to stop them in their tracks. Lets say they land the t1 chalice. Fine, our 1cmc cards are out, t1, cast a 1cmc card and get it countered to aid a bridge draw later, wrench mind will still hit like a truck on t2 as they're likely down to 3 cards in hand with little pressure. Victim of night is good here, as is pack rat. T3 liliana or bridge would be brutal towards them. There is always a point to playing it out unless you have 0% chance to win, people with a mentality that would scoop otherwise are a delight to play against - free wins. I have won many a stalled out board by building up to 10 rats or so, ulting liliana targetting myself - and swinging in for mega damage. I've won games like this vs people who have sideboarded in dedicated hate like leyline. Liliana truly can take over a game by herself even without a win con already on board. You'll draw one eventually. If they can't answer immediately, you can eventually ult her and make them choose between their lands / creatures (if any remain), or the one card stopping you from possibly winning on the spot, and that's only if you haven't built a pack rat army by that stage.
Honestly I feel 8rack has a good matchup vs eldrazi, as we're faster initially than they are. It's easy to strip their early plays away, and it's easy to clean up anything that slipped through. T1 chalice is a nuisance, but it can be beaten (worth mentioning that it's super uncommon) - and chances are they keep a risky hand only because it has the chalice. I disagree with your summary of rack vs eldrazi, I feel you're wrong - but that's my opinion.
One downside I noticed from watching CFBs eldrazi v. twin series is how easy it is for eldrazi to cast chalice for 3. Perhaps engineered explosives is a good idea.
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I see a lot of EE talk when Rachet Bomb is just as good and the same overall cost.
Love the swamp enchants as hate for this deck and Tron.
Eldrazi is actually just the type of deck 8 Rack needs to succeed. Very happy that so many people are jumping onboard.
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In case I didn't tell you, I don't care about your opinion I just want your facts. And not the facts that make you seem smart. I want the ones that are actual facts.
Such a neysayer to pack rat, it's truly a great card.
Eldrazi is primarily a creature deck, they will struggle vs e.bridge, REALLY struggle, almost guaranteed to stop them in their tracks. Lets say they land the t1 chalice. Fine, our 1cmc cards are out, t1, cast a 1cmc card and get it countered to aid a bridge draw later, wrench mind will still hit like a truck on t2 as they're likely down to 3 cards in hand with little pressure. Victim of night is good here, as is pack rat. T3 liliana or bridge would be brutal towards them. There is always a point to playing it out unless you have 0% chance to win, people with a mentality that would scoop otherwise are a delight to play against - free wins. I have won many a stalled out board by building up to 10 rats or so, ulting liliana targetting myself - and swinging in for mega damage. I've won games like this vs people who have sideboarded in dedicated hate like leyline. Liliana truly can take over a game by herself even without a win con already on board. You'll draw one eventually. If they can't answer immediately, you can eventually ult her and make them choose between their lands / creatures (if any remain), or the one card stopping you from possibly winning on the spot, and that's only if you haven't built a pack rat army by that stage.
Honestly I feel 8rack has a good matchup vs eldrazi, as we're faster initially than they are. It's easy to strip their early plays away, and it's easy to clean up anything that slipped through. T1 chalice is a nuisance, but it can be beaten (worth mentioning that it's super uncommon) - and chances are they keep a risky hand only because it has the chalice. I disagree with your summary of rack vs eldrazi, I feel you're wrong - but that's my opinion.
The moment you say "we are faster initially than they are", with them being undisputedly and unanimously proclaimed as the fastest deck in the format (and I mean proclaimed by people who are actually good at the game and top8 pro tours, not you and me), your comment loses 90% of it's credibility. Even if that weren't the case, you are still living in a dreamland scenario where you miraculously draw into Bridge by turn 3 in a deck without a card advantage engine, where you always have multiple Thoughtseize (because Inquisition hits either nothing or irrelevant cards and Wrench Mind does very much not bother the eldrazi deck too much), where they neither have the Chalice opener nor the turn 2 combo kill (that's rare, true), where they miraculously don't have the Thought-knot Seer to take away your single saving grace or Reality Smasher, which auto-counters every spell pointed at it because you are 8Rack and your hand is empty. After the constellations align and you meet all of those conditions you are relying on a 2 mana 1/1 vanilla creature to not get killed (again, for no reason whatsoever) AND for them to not find the main deck ratchet bomb do destroy your bridge or the miraculous army of 10 10/10s that's such a common play for you.
It was cheap before the scalpers bought out the stock and the price jumped 200% practically over night. It sucks, but when brewing up deck lists you can't really take secondary market costs into account. Otherwise you just hobble yourself.
There are a couple new 8Rack players here so I thought I would catch them up to speed on the infamously recurring Pack Rat debate. Personally I dislike it but I understand why so many use it as it lets you do something productive with what would be otherwise a dead card (ex. Thoughtseize when your opponents hand is empty) and it helps you remain hellbent (0 cards in hand) to abuse cards like Ensnaring Bridge or Sea Gate Wreckage. It definitely synergies with 8Rack as a nifty piece of tech in addition to being an alternate win con.
So far it seems pretty sweet right, so whats to debate? For me it ultimately comes down to value. Lets take a minute to dissect Pack Rat.
1 Rat: you just payed 2mana for a 1/1 that has had effectively 0 impact on the game. So far its terrible values
2 Rats: by using Pack Rats ability you have essentially payed 5 mana for two Bear Cubs. Still terrible value and the hilarious part is they basically have defender if your Ensnaring Bridge is out.
3Rats: 8 mana and 3 cards later you now have 3x Nessian Courser's. Congratulations, with 3 rats out PR has upgraded from terrible value to vanilla value.
4Rats: 11mana and 4 cards later you have 4x 4/4s. At this point we are starting to see some value out of our investment, not a ton of value and certainly not the value of the average modern card but more then vanilla 3/3s for 3.
5Rats: Ok you know what, I will concede that we are looking at modern level value at this point with 5x 5/5's in exchange for 5 cards and merely 14 mana but how long did it take us to get here? The game is likely over by now.
In addition to being slow/ poor value it's easy to disrupt. A single Echoing Truth, Maelstrom Pulse or Engineered Explosives could be BRUTAL while more conventional board wipes will easily gain a serious advantage considering your creatures are just stupid beaters that are neither resilient, evasive nor have a triggered ability.
Now some might argue that I have failed to consider that the rats essentially have flash which makes them a lot more valuable. While that is almost true the reason flash is so useful is to surprise your opponent with a creature they may not have seen coming (or play some Jedi mind tricks and make them think you have a card when you don't). When the flash creature is on display as an activated ability you will never have that element of uncertainty.
Pack Rat and Ensnaring Bridge. I'm honestly not sure if this is a combo or a nonbo. Pack Rat helps you stay hellbent enabling the bridge to do its thing but the catch 22 is the bridge disables your army of Rats. Some will argue that you can sacrifice your bridge with Lili's ultimate and then swing for the win but imo that's extremely win-more.
Anyway I hope this helps inform some of the new players about the pro's and con's of Pack Rat. Personally I find it to slow and ultimately underpowered for an elite format like modern but others love it for the synergy and because it fills a niche hole that 8rack needs filled.
There are a couple new 8Rack players here so I thought I would catch them up to speed on the infamously recurring Pack Rat debate. Personally I dislike it but I understand why so many use it as it lets you do something productive with what would be otherwise a dead card (ex. Thoughtseize when your opponents hand is empty) and it helps you remain hellbent (0 cards in hand) to abuse cards like Ensnaring Bridge or Sea Gate Wreckage. It definitely synergies with 8Rack as a nifty piece of tech in addition to being an alternate win con.
So far it seems pretty sweet right, so whats to debate? For me it ultimately comes down to value. Lets take a minute to dissect Pack Rat.
1 Rat: you just payed 2mana for a 1/1 that has had effectively 0 impact on the game. So far its terrible values
2 Rats: by using Pack Rats ability you have essentially payed 5 mana for two Bear Cubs. Still terrible value and the hilarious part is they basically have defender if your Ensnaring Bridge is out.
3Rats: 8 mana and 3 cards later you now have 3x Nessian Courser's. Congratulations, with 3 rats out PR has upgraded from terrible value to vanilla value.
4Rats: 11mana and 4 cards later you have 4x 4/4s. At this point we are starting to see some value out of our investment, not a ton of value and certainly not the value of the average modern card but more then vanilla 3/3s for 3.
5Rats: Ok you know what, I will concede that we are looking at modern level value at this point with 5x 5/5's in exchange for 5 cards and merely 14 mana but how long did it take us to get here? The game is likely over by now.
In addition to being slow/ poor value it's easy to disrupt. A single Echoing Truth, Maelstrom Pulse or Engineered Explosives could be BRUTAL while more conventional board wipes will easily gain a serious advantage considering your creatures are just stupid beaters that are neither resilient, evasive nor have a triggered ability.
Now some might argue that I have failed to consider that the rats essentially have flash which makes them a lot more valuable. While that is almost true the reason flash is so useful is to surprise your opponent with a creature they may not have seen coming (or play some Jedi mind tricks and make them think you have a card when you don't). When the flash creature is on display as an activated ability you will never have that element of uncertainty.
Pack Rat and Ensnaring Bridge. I'm honestly not sure if this is a combo or a nonbo. Pack Rat helps you stay hellbent enabling the bridge to do its thing but the catch 22 is the bridge disables your army of Rats. Some will argue that you can sacrifice your bridge with Lili's ultimate and then swing for the win but imo that's extremely win-more.
Anyway I hope this helps inform some of the new players about the pro's and con's of Pack Rat. Personally I find it to slow and ultimately underpowered for an elite format like modern but others love it for the synergy and because it fills a niche hole that 8rack needs filled.
Great explanation! Thank you. I'd pretty much picked up why some are anti-Pack Rat here from reading through a good chunk of the thread, but this definitely adds to my understanding. So for those who don't use Pack Rat, what do you choose to use instead? Different cheap creatures? More removal or counter spells? What are the better options?
Precisely that is why I wish we had a BW fastland, ala Blackcleave Cliffs, so we could splash white relatively painlessly for Lingering Souls and Path to Exile. Path is way, way better than the removal we play, and you can open and close the bridge pretty easily to let your 1/1 spirits fly through. Without that land, or a BW battleland ala Cinder Glade, I'm not going to bother, since the lifeloss from a shockland can be totally relevant here.
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I can't say I'm pleased to see you and must warn you I may have to do something about it.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: URDelver
Modern: UGRDelver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
It was cheap before the scalpers bought out the stock and the price jumped 200% practically over night. It sucks, but when brewing up deck lists you can't really take secondary market costs into account. Otherwise you just hobble yourself.
Did it literally jump in value in the past few days? If so, that sucks. I'd be fine if it was a $15-$20 card, but it looks like it's around a $35 card now, which is pretty hefty. But I'll probably spring for it, or try to do some trading or selling to cover it. Seems a pretty important piece right now.
It was cheap before the scalpers bought out the stock and the price jumped 200% practically over night. It sucks, but when brewing up deck lists you can't really take secondary market costs into account. Otherwise you just hobble yourself.
Did it literally jump in value in the past few days? If so, that sucks. I'd be fine if it was a $15-$20 card, but it looks like it's around a $35 card now, which is pretty hefty. But I'll probably spring for it, or try to do some trading or selling to cover it. Seems a pretty important piece right now.
Actually, I see it's not really a $35 card. Seems to be available for $25-$30.
It was cheap before the scalpers bought out the stock and the price jumped 200% practically over night. It sucks, but when brewing up deck lists you can't really take secondary market costs into account. Otherwise you just hobble yourself.
Did it literally jump in value in the past few days? If so, that sucks. I'd be fine if it was a $15-$20 card, but it looks like it's around a $35 card now, which is pretty hefty. But I'll probably spring for it, or try to do some trading or selling to cover it. Seems a pretty important piece right now.
Yes. It was ~$12 this past Sunday, February 7. It was in the 30's by Tuesday. There are discussions about the secondary market elsewhere on MTGS, but in short painter's servant is one of many cards that have been spiking like this in the recent weeks.
Great explanation! Thank you. I'd pretty much picked up why some are anti-Pack Rat here from reading through a good chunk of the thread, but this definitely adds to my understanding. So for those who don't use Pack Rat, what do you choose to use instead? Different cheap creatures? More removal or counter spells? What are the better options?
This is the million dollar question, everyone messes around with different cards and there really is no clear winner but here are a few I've tried/ seen used in other lists.
Bitterblossom: It is resilient against most board wipes as it's simply slowed but not completely dealt with. It has insane value as it makes an army of 1/1 flyers in exchange for a mere 1 card and 2 mana. And the best part is your one powered evasive army can still swing with a bridge out. The problem with blossom is it can cost you a LOT of life and against an aggressive burn deck it will cost you the game.
Young Pyromancer: I'm using this at the moment because it still gives you a 1/1 army that can swing under the bridge without the side effect of killing yourself with life loss. She also synergizes well with smallpox because you can sac the token you just made when you cast smallpox. There really is no down side here, its mainly a question of is it strong enough and tbh i haven't decided. I haven't had time to properly test it yet.
Bloodghast: Synergizes with Dakmor Salvage and Smallpox. The resiliency is clearly what makes it shine however it can't block and with Ensnaring Bridge out it can't attack either so it can potentially do nothing.
Waste Not: For just 2 mana you get a token army, card advantage and ramp all rolled into one tiny enchantment. The problem with it is it does nothing on its own and you can't really bank on any particular outcome as its based on your opponents discard. The other problem is it does nothing once your opponents hand is empty.
Its fun to note that an active Sea Gate Wreckage will allow 2 powered creatures to swing under the bridge.
As you mentioned in your post many will not run any alternate win-cons opting for more removal instead. Board wipes like Damnation or Anger of the Gods can be used fairly effectively in this type of 8Rack list.
I hope this answers your question. I'm sure there are more options out there you just need to look around at different lists.
On painter's servant prices, you folks must be talking paper prices. On line it's around $14 for modo. Still about 3x what it was prior to the eldrazi pt.
On the pack rat v. bitterblossom debate: each option is solid. Bitterblossom is a cheaper investment, pack rat turns chaff into rats. Each one has their place and that's determined a bit by style of play. I get a lot of pack rats bolted/pathed before they take over the game. The good part is that the opponent has to kill rat, which takes a card out of their hand. The downside is twofold. First pack rat turns on all their removal so the opponent gets value from what could be dead cards. Second I'm trading a resource one for one, and since there's few ways to generate any card advantage for us that's important. You almost need to consider pack rat another discard spell. IMHO bitterblossom might be better against the eldrazi in that there's only one trampler in reality smasher. Otherwise free fae chump all their beef. Who wants to sac a dude to tap down a faerie token?
Which is better, or nyxathid, all depends on your style of play. Did you want to try to beat face with rats or drop bridge and ping with fliers? Is nyxathid bridge enough? I used nyx and one pack rat w/swarmyard to hold off long enough for a win, and that's all I really want.
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Great explanation! Thank you. I'd pretty much picked up why some are anti-Pack Rat here from reading through a good chunk of the thread, but this definitely adds to my understanding. So for those who don't use Pack Rat, what do you choose to use instead? Different cheap creatures? More removal or counter spells? What are the better options?
This is the million dollar question, everyone messes around with different cards and there really is no clear winner but here are a few I've tried/ seen used in other lists.
Bitterblossom: It is resilient against most board wipes as it's simply slowed but not completely dealt with. It has insane value as it makes an army of 1/1 flyers in exchange for a mere 1 card and 2 mana. And the best part is your one powered evasive army can still swing with a bridge out. The problem with blossom is it can cost you a LOT of life and against an aggressive burn deck it will cost you the game.
Young Pyromancer: I'm using this at the moment because it still gives you a 1/1 army that can swing under the bridge without the side effect of killing yourself with life loss. She also synergizes well with smallpox because you can sac the token you just made when you cast smallpox. There really is no down side here, its mainly a question of is it strong enough and tbh i haven't decided. I haven't had time to properly test it yet.
Bloodghast: Synergizes with Dakmore Salvage and Smallpox. The resiliency is clearly what makes it shine however it can't block and with Ensnaring Bridge out it can't attack either so it can potentially do nothing.
Waste Not: For just 2 mana you get a token army, card advantage and ramp all rolled into one tiny enchantment. The problem with it is it does nothing on its own and you can't really bank on any particular outcome as its based on your opponents discard. The other problem is it does nothing once your opponents hand is empty.
Its fun to note that an active Sea Gate Wreckage will allow 2 powered creatures to swing under the bridge.
As you mentioned in your post many will not run any alternate win-cons opting for more removal instead. Board wipes like Damnation or Anger of the Gods can be used fairly effectively in this type of 8Rack list.
I hope this answers your question. I'm sure there are more options out there you just need to look around at different lists.
Erhmgrhd I just thought off playing Young Peezy with Smallpox. I'm in love.
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In case I didn't tell you, I don't care about your opinion I just want your facts. And not the facts that make you seem smart. I want the ones that are actual facts.
Instead of Rat I either play my beloved Bitterblossom or more removal, depending on the meta. Right now, since I find myself in a position where I must find Bridge, I'm running a draw engine to help me dig through my deck for it. No, it's not Dark Confidant.
There are a couple new 8Rack players here so I thought I would catch them up to speed on the infamously recurring Pack Rat debate. Personally I dislike it but I understand why so many use it as it lets you do something productive with what would be otherwise a dead card (ex. Thoughtseize when your opponents hand is empty) and it helps you remain hellbent (0 cards in hand) to abuse cards like Ensnaring Bridge or Sea Gate Wreckage. It definitely synergies with 8Rack as a nifty piece of tech in addition to being an alternate win con.
So far it seems pretty sweet right, so whats to debate? For me it ultimately comes down to value. Lets take a minute to dissect Pack Rat.
1 Rat: you just payed 2mana for a 1/1 that has had effectively 0 impact on the game. So far its terrible values
2 Rats: by using Pack Rats ability you have essentially payed 5 mana for two Bear Cubs. Still terrible value and the hilarious part is they basically have defender if your Ensnaring Bridge is out.
3Rats: 8 mana and 3 cards later you now have 3x Nessian Courser's. Congratulations, with 3 rats out PR has upgraded from terrible value to vanilla value.
4Rats: 11mana and 4 cards later you have 4x 4/4s. At this point we are starting to see some value out of our investment, not a ton of value and certainly not the value of the average modern card but more then vanilla 3/3s for 3.
5Rats: Ok you know what, I will concede that we are looking at modern level value at this point with 5x 5/5's in exchange for 5 cards and merely 14 mana but how long did it take us to get here? The game is likely over by now.
In addition to being slow/ poor value it's easy to disrupt. A single Echoing Truth, Maelstrom Pulse or Engineered Explosives could be BRUTAL while more conventional board wipes will easily gain a serious advantage considering your creatures are just stupid beaters that are neither resilient, evasive nor have a triggered ability.
Now some might argue that I have failed to consider that the rats essentially have flash which makes them a lot more valuable. While that is almost true the reason flash is so useful is to surprise your opponent with a creature they may not have seen coming (or play some Jedi mind tricks and make them think you have a card when you don't). When the flash creature is on display as an activated ability you will never have that element of uncertainty.
Pack Rat and Ensnaring Bridge. I'm honestly not sure if this is a combo or a nonbo. Pack Rat helps you stay hellbent enabling the bridge to do its thing but the catch 22 is the bridge disables your army of Rats. Some will argue that you can sacrifice your bridge with Lili's ultimate and then swing for the win but imo that's extremely win-more.
Anyway I hope this helps inform some of the new players about the pro's and con's of Pack Rat. Personally I find it to slow and ultimately underpowered for an elite format like modern but others love it for the synergy and because it fills a niche hole that 8rack needs filled.
Great explanation! Thank you. I'd pretty much picked up why some are anti-Pack Rat here from reading through a good chunk of the thread, but this definitely adds to my understanding. So for those who don't use Pack Rat, what do you choose to use instead? Different cheap creatures? More removal or counter spells? What are the better options?
There is no replacement for Pack Rat honestly. Bitterblossom accomplishes some of what Pack Rat gives us, and it has some trade-offs, but ultimately BB does not give us the late game inevitability that Pack Rat gives us. Pack Rat and his cousin nyxathid as a main deck package gives the deck resilience in the face of fast aggro and inevitability against decks that would otherwise beat us in the later turns like Junk. Yes Rat requires resources, but guess what? All of the investments that it needs we have to spare. The investment required might look like a lot on paper as you have it written out above BUT it makes no mention of the fact that those same resources would completely go to waste otherwise in our deck. Extra discard spells or lands or anything at all that you draw now has meaningful value. Raven's Crime does for lands what Pack Rat does for everything else.
Now back to Eldrazi. How good is 8Rack vs Eldrazi? It's so good that even after intentionally handicapping my list against a buddy of mine in paper, (bridges in the sideboard) I still managed to destroy in 8 out of 10 matches. The 2 matches I lost were games where he dropped multiple mimics turn 1 on the play. This was a rare exception, and even then I felt like I had a pretty good chance, my deck doesn't ALWAYS pay out though. THe reason I wanted to test with Bridges in the side is because this gives us a pretty solid match against all of the anti-eldrazi decks that are popping up. Now to be fair, this was in Paper magic, and I WAS using Bitterblossoms (a departure from what you may have seen in my vieos) but still.
The eldrazi match up is in our favor, and eldrazi has pushed Tron out of the format. I dare say this is the absolute perfect storm for 8Rack to win something big right now. Even better, if they end up banning something in eldrazi it will surely be Eye at the least, and that kills off Tron for good. Die tron. Die in a cold empty grave.
I actually already had Contaminated Ground in my sideboard cause like 4 players at my LCS ran Tron regularly lol
Modern: B 8RACK B
EDH: BRU Mishra, Artificer Prodigy BRU, W Kemba, Kha Regent W, B Ghoulcaller Gisa B, BU Oona, Queen of the Fae BU, G Seton, Krosan Protector G, BW Ayli, Eternal Pilgrim BW, R Purphoros, God of the Forge R, UGW Arcades, the Strategist UGW, GW Karametra, God of Harvests GW, GU Edric, Spymaster of Trest GU, UW Grand Arbiter Augustin IV UW, BRW Kaalia of the Vast BRW, BRU Nekusar, the Mindrazer BRU, BGWU Thrasios, Triton Hero/Tymna the Weaver BGWU
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Eldrazi is primarily a creature deck, they will struggle vs e.bridge, REALLY struggle, almost guaranteed to stop them in their tracks. Lets say they land the t1 chalice. Fine, our 1cmc cards are out, t1, cast a 1cmc card and get it countered to aid a bridge draw later, wrench mind will still hit like a truck on t2 as they're likely down to 3 cards in hand with little pressure. Victim of night is good here, as is pack rat. T3 liliana or bridge would be brutal towards them. There is always a point to playing it out unless you have 0% chance to win, people with a mentality that would scoop otherwise are a delight to play against - free wins. I have won many a stalled out board by building up to 10 rats or so, ulting liliana targetting myself - and swinging in for mega damage. I've won games like this vs people who have sideboarded in dedicated hate like leyline. Liliana truly can take over a game by herself even without a win con already on board. You'll draw one eventually. If they can't answer immediately, you can eventually ult her and make them choose between their lands / creatures (if any remain), or the one card stopping you from possibly winning on the spot, and that's only if you haven't built a pack rat army by that stage.
Honestly I feel 8rack has a good matchup vs eldrazi, as we're faster initially than they are. It's easy to strip their early plays away, and it's easy to clean up anything that slipped through. T1 chalice is a nuisance, but it can be beaten (worth mentioning that it's super uncommon) - and chances are they keep a risky hand only because it has the chalice. I disagree with your summary of rack vs eldrazi, I feel you're wrong - but that's my opinion.
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Love the swamp enchants as hate for this deck and Tron.
Eldrazi is actually just the type of deck 8 Rack needs to succeed. Very happy that so many people are jumping onboard.
Cockatrice username: Blackcat77
The moment you say "we are faster initially than they are", with them being undisputedly and unanimously proclaimed as the fastest deck in the format (and I mean proclaimed by people who are actually good at the game and top8 pro tours, not you and me), your comment loses 90% of it's credibility. Even if that weren't the case, you are still living in a dreamland scenario where you miraculously draw into Bridge by turn 3 in a deck without a card advantage engine, where you always have multiple Thoughtseize (because Inquisition hits either nothing or irrelevant cards and Wrench Mind does very much not bother the eldrazi deck too much), where they neither have the Chalice opener nor the turn 2 combo kill (that's rare, true), where they miraculously don't have the Thought-knot Seer to take away your single saving grace or Reality Smasher, which auto-counters every spell pointed at it because you are 8Rack and your hand is empty. After the constellations align and you meet all of those conditions you are relying on a 2 mana 1/1 vanilla creature to not get killed (again, for no reason whatsoever) AND for them to not find the main deck ratchet bomb do destroy your bridge or the miraculous army of 10 10/10s that's such a common play for you.
So far it seems pretty sweet right, so whats to debate? For me it ultimately comes down to value. Lets take a minute to dissect Pack Rat.
1 Rat: you just payed 2mana for a 1/1 that has had effectively 0 impact on the game. So far its terrible values
2 Rats: by using Pack Rats ability you have essentially payed 5 mana for two Bear Cubs. Still terrible value and the hilarious part is they basically have defender if your Ensnaring Bridge is out.
3Rats: 8 mana and 3 cards later you now have 3x Nessian Courser's. Congratulations, with 3 rats out PR has upgraded from terrible value to vanilla value.
4Rats: 11mana and 4 cards later you have 4x 4/4s. At this point we are starting to see some value out of our investment, not a ton of value and certainly not the value of the average modern card but more then vanilla 3/3s for 3.
5Rats: Ok you know what, I will concede that we are looking at modern level value at this point with 5x 5/5's in exchange for 5 cards and merely 14 mana but how long did it take us to get here? The game is likely over by now.
In addition to being slow/ poor value it's easy to disrupt. A single Echoing Truth, Maelstrom Pulse or Engineered Explosives could be BRUTAL while more conventional board wipes will easily gain a serious advantage considering your creatures are just stupid beaters that are neither resilient, evasive nor have a triggered ability.
Now some might argue that I have failed to consider that the rats essentially have flash which makes them a lot more valuable. While that is almost true the reason flash is so useful is to surprise your opponent with a creature they may not have seen coming (or play some Jedi mind tricks and make them think you have a card when you don't). When the flash creature is on display as an activated ability you will never have that element of uncertainty.
Pack Rat and Ensnaring Bridge. I'm honestly not sure if this is a combo or a nonbo. Pack Rat helps you stay hellbent enabling the bridge to do its thing but the catch 22 is the bridge disables your army of Rats. Some will argue that you can sacrifice your bridge with Lili's ultimate and then swing for the win but imo that's extremely win-more.
Anyway I hope this helps inform some of the new players about the pro's and con's of Pack Rat. Personally I find it to slow and ultimately underpowered for an elite format like modern but others love it for the synergy and because it fills a niche hole that 8rack needs filled.
BChainer, Dementia Master(Big Mana/Reanimator)
BRRakdos, The Showstopper (Mass Life Loss/Ramp)
BUThe Scarab God (Zombie Tribal/Control)
BWKarlov of the Ghost Council (Life Gain)
BGJarad, Golgari Lich Lord (Stompy/Dredge)
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher (Tokens/Non-infinite Combo)
Great explanation! Thank you. I'd pretty much picked up why some are anti-Pack Rat here from reading through a good chunk of the thread, but this definitely adds to my understanding. So for those who don't use Pack Rat, what do you choose to use instead? Different cheap creatures? More removal or counter spells? What are the better options?
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: UR Delver
Modern: UGR Delver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
Did it literally jump in value in the past few days? If so, that sucks. I'd be fine if it was a $15-$20 card, but it looks like it's around a $35 card now, which is pretty hefty. But I'll probably spring for it, or try to do some trading or selling to cover it. Seems a pretty important piece right now.
Actually, I see it's not really a $35 card. Seems to be available for $25-$30.
Yes. It was ~$12 this past Sunday, February 7. It was in the 30's by Tuesday. There are discussions about the secondary market elsewhere on MTGS, but in short painter's servant is one of many cards that have been spiking like this in the recent weeks.
Bitterblossom: It is resilient against most board wipes as it's simply slowed but not completely dealt with. It has insane value as it makes an army of 1/1 flyers in exchange for a mere 1 card and 2 mana. And the best part is your one powered evasive army can still swing with a bridge out. The problem with blossom is it can cost you a LOT of life and against an aggressive burn deck it will cost you the game.
Young Pyromancer: I'm using this at the moment because it still gives you a 1/1 army that can swing under the bridge without the side effect of killing yourself with life loss. She also synergizes well with smallpox because you can sac the token you just made when you cast smallpox. There really is no down side here, its mainly a question of is it strong enough and tbh i haven't decided. I haven't had time to properly test it yet.
Bloodghast: Synergizes with Dakmor Salvage and Smallpox. The resiliency is clearly what makes it shine however it can't block and with Ensnaring Bridge out it can't attack either so it can potentially do nothing.
Waste Not: For just 2 mana you get a token army, card advantage and ramp all rolled into one tiny enchantment. The problem with it is it does nothing on its own and you can't really bank on any particular outcome as its based on your opponents discard. The other problem is it does nothing once your opponents hand is empty.
Its fun to note that an active Sea Gate Wreckage will allow 2 powered creatures to swing under the bridge.
As you mentioned in your post many will not run any alternate win-cons opting for more removal instead. Board wipes like Damnation or Anger of the Gods can be used fairly effectively in this type of 8Rack list.
I hope this answers your question. I'm sure there are more options out there you just need to look around at different lists.
BChainer, Dementia Master(Big Mana/Reanimator)
BRRakdos, The Showstopper (Mass Life Loss/Ramp)
BUThe Scarab God (Zombie Tribal/Control)
BWKarlov of the Ghost Council (Life Gain)
BGJarad, Golgari Lich Lord (Stompy/Dredge)
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher (Tokens/Non-infinite Combo)
On the pack rat v. bitterblossom debate: each option is solid. Bitterblossom is a cheaper investment, pack rat turns chaff into rats. Each one has their place and that's determined a bit by style of play. I get a lot of pack rats bolted/pathed before they take over the game. The good part is that the opponent has to kill rat, which takes a card out of their hand. The downside is twofold. First pack rat turns on all their removal so the opponent gets value from what could be dead cards. Second I'm trading a resource one for one, and since there's few ways to generate any card advantage for us that's important. You almost need to consider pack rat another discard spell. IMHO bitterblossom might be better against the eldrazi in that there's only one trampler in reality smasher. Otherwise free fae chump all their beef. Who wants to sac a dude to tap down a faerie token?
Which is better, or nyxathid, all depends on your style of play. Did you want to try to beat face with rats or drop bridge and ping with fliers? Is nyxathid bridge enough? I used nyx and one pack rat w/swarmyard to hold off long enough for a win, and that's all I really want.
UB Tezzerator
UBW Gifts
B 8Rack
Legacy
RB Goblins
Erhmgrhd I just thought off playing Young Peezy with Smallpox. I'm in love.
Cockatrice username: Blackcat77
Now back to Eldrazi. How good is 8Rack vs Eldrazi? It's so good that even after intentionally handicapping my list against a buddy of mine in paper, (bridges in the sideboard) I still managed to destroy in 8 out of 10 matches. The 2 matches I lost were games where he dropped multiple mimics turn 1 on the play. This was a rare exception, and even then I felt like I had a pretty good chance, my deck doesn't ALWAYS pay out though. THe reason I wanted to test with Bridges in the side is because this gives us a pretty solid match against all of the anti-eldrazi decks that are popping up. Now to be fair, this was in Paper magic, and I WAS using Bitterblossoms (a departure from what you may have seen in my vieos) but still.
The eldrazi match up is in our favor, and eldrazi has pushed Tron out of the format. I dare say this is the absolute perfect storm for 8Rack to win something big right now. Even better, if they end up banning something in eldrazi it will surely be Eye at the least, and that kills off Tron for good. Die tron. Die in a cold empty grave.