When playing Dark Confidant you usually want to play something around 2 to 3 four drops. 3 8 CMC, 2 5 cmc and 2 4 cmc will just cause you to lose most of your games to bob.
When playing Dark Confidant you usually want to play something around 2 to 3 four drops. 3 8 CMC, 2 5 cmc and 2 4 cmc will just cause you to lose most of your games to bob.
Any of you guys did try waste not in the wall/other random spot? I was looking at all permanent in modern that cost 2 in our colour pie and truly its quite desapointing.
Waste not could give us some needed pressure and blocker and also can give card advantage. I think it could fit with us playing 6 discard spell and 4 lili, also maybe add 1-2 raven's crime
What you guys think?
Also one of my friend I was playtesting it, did try to convince me that terminate is better then path in this type of deck. He was arguing that we try to deny as much as possible and give them free land its not optimal as they will
be more easy for them to cast their top deck card. He is a good player did perform well in couple of grand prix, usally I listen to him but not convince about that one
And we could slpsh green for just tarmo and decay I guess lol
Any of you guys did try waste not in the wall/other random spot? I was looking at all permanent in modern that cost 2 in our colour pie and truly its quite desapointing.
Waste not could give us some needed pressure and blocker and also can give card advantage. I think it could fit with us playing 6 discard spell and 4 lili, also maybe add 1-2 raven's crime
What you guys think?
Also one of my friend I was playtesting it, did try to convince me that terminate is better then path in this type of deck. He was arguing that we try to deny as much as possible and give them free land its not optimal as they will
be more easy for them to cast their top deck card. He is a good player did perform well in couple of grand prix, usally I listen to him but not convince about that one
And we could slpsh green for just tarmo and decay I guess lol
I madly love waste not. I've mad a deck entirely focused on the card but even with this approach the deck lacks consistency. Not worth in mardu, imo.
About the terminate: I agree with your friend. Path is easier to cast but we want to lock the enemy battlefield. I'm trying a build with more terminate's.
When playing Dark Confidant you usually want to play something around 2 to 3 four drops. 3 8 CMC, 2 5 cmc and 2 4 cmc will just cause you to lose most of your games to bob.
One or the other change the deck your going to play completely. I personally really like bob and build midrange around him. If you want to go ther other way Young pyro is ineresting. I would definitely go down to 2 and maybe 1 bedlam, card seems strong but you really don't want to have more than 1 in your hand, Gurmag Angler is great too but can sometime sucks with GDD.
@Trextik, Forget about waste not, will be dead most of the time. It's not even played in 8 rack outside of sb. About Path vs Terminate, both are great, we don't try to deny their lands anyway. I personally run 3/3.
Seems like a pretty typical Nahiri control deck. I think the problem with Mardu Control is that it is vulnerable to top-decks (no counter-spells), no deck manipulation (serum visions, snapcaster), less resilient man-lands, and you are running less removals than even midrange decks like Jund. It does a whole lot of nothing for a few turns and generally creatures decks can get around your removal suite with cards like Collected Company. If I ran the deck myself, I would run a couple more board wipes and Lightning Helix in the main even with Wall of Omen on the field.
Seems like a pretty typical Nahiri control deck. I think the problem with Mardu Control is that it is vulnerable to top-decks (no counter-spells), no deck manipulation (serum visions, snapcaster), less resilient man-lands, and you are running less removals than even midrange decks like Jund. It does a whole lot of nothing for a few turns and generally creatures decks can get around your removal suite with cards like Collected Company. If I ran the deck myself, I would run a couple more board wipes and Lightning Helix in the main even with Wall of Omen on the field.
It feels like a weird Mardu variant. The 1-of Go for the Throat should just be a Terminate (Extra color but strictly better in almost every other way), no Crackling Dooms, weird 1 of Crucible of Worlds mainboard plus ghost quarters/Tec edges main. They'll stress an already stressed manabase.
If you're going to pick Mardu over Jeskai, you need to go all in on the value train. That list looks more like somewhere between Sex Prison and Mardu Midrange.
Slaughter pact is really good in this as you tap out turn 3 and 4 for Planeswalker
Lightning Helix is a 2-for-1 against Burn and is a big tempo play against traditional aggro decks. If your meta is full of Eldrazi and BGx midrange, obviously it doesn't make sense to run Lightning Helix. But in an open meta, it is a fantastic card.
Terminate is good but I truly believe Dismember is the better alternative (though only as a 1-of). I am not the first person to say this but the reasoning goes as follows:
With 3+ mana available, they are almost equivalent depending on what you need to cast
With 2 mana open, terminate is harder to cast while dismember requires 2 life.
With 1 mana open, dismember is infinitely better than terminate. You cannot underestimate the flexibility of being able to cast something for one (colorless) mana. In play testing, this has been a big deal breaker.
I believe the argument was made my former Jund pros like Willy Edel. And Terminate is easily better in Jund than it is in Mardu, as Mardu has 4 Path to Exile to deal with difficult threats (Ulamog, Wormcoil Engine, Master of Waves, etc.). If I needed more than 4 hard removals, I would first consider 1 dismember and THEN I would add 1 terminate.
Slaughter Pact isn't bad. However, Michael Majors - a Grixis control player - regrets playing it even for the Kalitas + Pact synergy. It can't handle some very important threats such as Tasigur, Gurmag Angler, Death's Shadow, etc. If you run 4 Path to Exile, it probably doesn't matter though.
Now we move on to Anguished Unmaking. To be frank, I do not think this card has a place in Modern. You're casting it on creatures 90% of the time. It's definitely less useful than something like Maelstrom Pulse, which generates tons of values in surprisingly many situations. In the end, 3 mana 3 life for a spot removal isn't where you want to be. If we want to deal with enchantments/ artifacts, we want more specific efficient answers for those. If we want to deal with planeswalkers, Dreadbore is more relevant against the Liliana&Nahiri decks (think about it, there is nothing else to hit besides some creatures). I would only play Anguished Unmaking against Tron (where its flexibility actually pays off) but against any other deck, it's pretty awful.
Damnation in the main is a good idea. Mardu Control is a heavily reactive deck that does nothing for the first few turns. If your removals don't line up well against your opponent's proactive threats, you're going to lose. It can take too long to stabilize against the hyper aggro decks. Some decks like Eldrazi and Dredge couldn't care less about your removal spells. Damnation can buy you a lot of time and can actually give you a good chance of stabilizing. Speaking of Eldrazi and Dredge, it would not be a bad idea to run Anger of the Gods but you may need some filter lands for the double red mana.
Seems like a pretty typical Nahiri control deck. I think the problem with Mardu Control is that it is vulnerable to top-decks (no counter-spells), no deck manipulation (serum visions, snapcaster), less resilient man-lands, and you are running less removals than even midrange decks like Jund. It does a whole lot of nothing for a few turns and generally creatures decks can get around your removal suite with cards like Collected Company. If I ran the deck myself, I would run a couple more board wipes and Lightning Helix in the main even with Wall of Omen on the field.
It feels like a weird Mardu variant. The 1-of Go for the Throat should just be a Terminate (Extra color but strictly better in almost every other way), no Crackling Dooms, weird 1 of Crucible of Worlds mainboard plus ghost quarters/Tec edges main. They'll stress an already stressed manabase.
If you're going to pick Mardu over Jeskai, you need to go all in on the value train. That list looks more like somewhere between Sex Prison and Mardu Midrange.
Definitely has some weird choices. Like you said, it runs 4 colorless sources in a 3-color deck. Not a great idea. Not every deck that performs well competitively is necessarily an optimal build. However, it's still a traditional Mardu Control deck with the same basic strategy, only with some land disruption.
The thing is Jeskai inherently has more value than Mardu - that's Mardu's big weakness. Their manlands are better, they have snapcaster mage, and they have ancestral/ serum visions. This leads to a better long-game and they don't even need Nahiri to win. But Mardu has two big advantages over Jeskai: (1) black hand disruption outclasses blue counter-magic in modern as a diverse answer and (2) Lingering Souls vs Affinity, Infect, and any grinding decks. It's hard to say which is the better build. Can't say I love either.
@jongsl5
Really Liked your write up for each card.
Slaughter Pact I have realized that it has it's moments when its not helpful. Like you said, it doesn't hit some heavy hitters including Siege Rhino. Also sometimes in the interactive match, you have more than 5 lands and you can afford to pay for to remove something and instead you just effect your next turn. The moment when you would rather have a path/terminate/dismember.
I ran Damnation in the mainboard. Loved it. Felt rough sometimes cause I personally run a bunch of 4 CMC already. But after your responce I plan to change my list up a bit.
Interesting list did do very well. Did he just get lucky? Sure the chance is small to reveal that Emrakul off Dark Confidant. My appoligies for not knowing the specific percent but when you multiply that number by number of games played in a round and then by the number of rounds. Emrakul will cost you a game or worse a match. When you need to go X-1 at a large event(X-2 maybe), it's just not worth it in my opinion. I'm sure there is a reason competitive Jund list don't play Tasigur.
@jongsl5
Really Liked your write up for each card.
Slaughter Pact I have realized that it has it's moments when its not helpful. Like you said, it doesn't hit some heavy hitters including Siege Rhino. Also sometimes in the interactive match, you have more than 5 lands and you can afford to pay for to remove something and instead you just effect your next turn. The moment when you would rather have a path/terminate/dismember.
I ran Damnation in the mainboard. Loved it. Felt rough sometimes cause I personally run a bunch of 4 CMC already. But after your responce I plan to change my list up a bit.
Interesting list did do very well. Did he just get lucky? Sure the chance is small to reveal that Emrakul off Dark Confidant. My appoligies for not knowing the specific percent but when you multiply that number by number of games played in a round and then by the number of rounds. Emrakul will cost you a game or worse a match. When you need to go X-1 at a large event(X-2 maybe), it's just not worth it in my opinion. I'm sure there is a reason competitive Jund list don't play Tasigur.
Glad you enjoyed the analysis. And something like Siege Rhino is probably going to be more popular because some pros like Michael Majors and Willy Edel are (apparently) starting to assert that Abzan is once again better than Jund. So expect amateurs to jump on the bandwagon.
Running more 4-drops can definitely be a problem. That's the sacrifice you make by making Nahiri your win-con. Anger of the Gods is probably almost as good right now however, with the exile effect being essential in some match-ups (Dredge, CoCo).
The reason why Jund no longer needs Tasigur has more to do with the fact that Kalitas was printed. Most people didn't mind the nonbo with Bob before. And now that we have Grim Flayer, Jund has better creatures that don't interfere with Goyf's power.
The chance of hitting Emrakul is fairly low but as for the rest of the deck, a lot of it is definitely questionable.
If a mardu deck is playing 4 Nahiri and 4 Kologans Command. Would it make sence to play Liquimetal Coating?
Well you shouldn't be playing 4 Kolaghan's Command in the first place. But to answer your question, no. You have to consider the probability of drawing that combination while playing, while at the same time thinking about the probability of times this combo will be relevant. The strength of Mardu is being able to provide the best possible answers to a wide variety of things. Liquimetal Coating doesn't exactly play to those strengths.
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When playing Dark Confidant you usually want to play something around 2 to 3 four drops. 3 8 CMC, 2 5 cmc and 2 4 cmc will just cause you to lose most of your games to bob.
Thanks for advice , maybe use Young Pyromancer instead bob?
and - 1 Bedlam Reveler for +1 Gurmag Angler?
Waste not could give us some needed pressure and blocker and also can give card advantage. I think it could fit with us playing 6 discard spell and 4 lili, also maybe add 1-2 raven's crime
What you guys think?
Also one of my friend I was playtesting it, did try to convince me that terminate is better then path in this type of deck. He was arguing that we try to deny as much as possible and give them free land its not optimal as they will
be more easy for them to cast their top deck card. He is a good player did perform well in couple of grand prix, usally I listen to him but not convince about that one
And we could slpsh green for just tarmo and decay I guess lol
I madly love waste not. I've mad a deck entirely focused on the card but even with this approach the deck lacks consistency. Not worth in mardu, imo.
About the terminate: I agree with your friend. Path is easier to cast but we want to lock the enemy battlefield. I'm trying a build with more terminate's.
One or the other change the deck your going to play completely. I personally really like bob and build midrange around him. If you want to go ther other way Young pyro is ineresting. I would definitely go down to 2 and maybe 1 bedlam, card seems strong but you really don't want to have more than 1 in your hand, Gurmag Angler is great too but can sometime sucks with GDD.
@Trextik, Forget about waste not, will be dead most of the time. It's not even played in 8 rack outside of sb. About Path vs Terminate, both are great, we don't try to deny their lands anyway. I personally run 3/3.
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/459155
4 Wall of Omens
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
Spells (30)
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Path to Exile
2 Thoughtseize
1 Dreadbore
1 Go for the Throat
2 Terminate
1 Anger of the Gods
1 Crucible of Worlds
4 Liliana of the Veil
4 Lingering Souls
4 Nahiri, the Harbinger
1 Arid Mesa
4 Blackcleave Cliffs
1 Blood Crypt
3 Bloodstained Mire
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Godless Shrine
1 Graven Cairns
2 Marsh Flats
1 Mountain
1 Needle Spires
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Shambling Vent
1 Swamp
1 Tectonic Edge
2 Ajani Vengeant
3 Anger of the Gods
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Duress
1 Rakdos Charm
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Stony Silence
1 Tectonic Edge
1 Wear // Tear
Seems like a pretty typical Nahiri control deck. I think the problem with Mardu Control is that it is vulnerable to top-decks (no counter-spells), no deck manipulation (serum visions, snapcaster), less resilient man-lands, and you are running less removals than even midrange decks like Jund. It does a whole lot of nothing for a few turns and generally creatures decks can get around your removal suite with cards like Collected Company. If I ran the deck myself, I would run a couple more board wipes and Lightning Helix in the main even with Wall of Omen on the field.
It feels like a weird Mardu variant. The 1-of Go for the Throat should just be a Terminate (Extra color but strictly better in almost every other way), no Crackling Dooms, weird 1 of Crucible of Worlds mainboard plus ghost quarters/Tec edges main. They'll stress an already stressed manabase.
If you're going to pick Mardu over Jeskai, you need to go all in on the value train. That list looks more like somewhere between Sex Prison and Mardu Midrange.
terminate
path to exile
dreadbore
slaughter pact
Anguished Unmaking
damnation
Slaughter pact is really good in this as you tap out turn 3 and 4 for Planeswalker
I think in a so creature heavy meta we will feel absolutly great.
This deck?
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=106552
Lightning Helix is a 2-for-1 against Burn and is a big tempo play against traditional aggro decks. If your meta is full of Eldrazi and BGx midrange, obviously it doesn't make sense to run Lightning Helix. But in an open meta, it is a fantastic card.
Terminate is good but I truly believe Dismember is the better alternative (though only as a 1-of). I am not the first person to say this but the reasoning goes as follows:
With 3+ mana available, they are almost equivalent depending on what you need to cast
With 2 mana open, terminate is harder to cast while dismember requires 2 life.
With 1 mana open, dismember is infinitely better than terminate. You cannot underestimate the flexibility of being able to cast something for one (colorless) mana. In play testing, this has been a big deal breaker.
I believe the argument was made my former Jund pros like Willy Edel. And Terminate is easily better in Jund than it is in Mardu, as Mardu has 4 Path to Exile to deal with difficult threats (Ulamog, Wormcoil Engine, Master of Waves, etc.). If I needed more than 4 hard removals, I would first consider 1 dismember and THEN I would add 1 terminate.
Slaughter Pact isn't bad. However, Michael Majors - a Grixis control player - regrets playing it even for the Kalitas + Pact synergy. It can't handle some very important threats such as Tasigur, Gurmag Angler, Death's Shadow, etc. If you run 4 Path to Exile, it probably doesn't matter though.
Now we move on to Anguished Unmaking. To be frank, I do not think this card has a place in Modern. You're casting it on creatures 90% of the time. It's definitely less useful than something like Maelstrom Pulse, which generates tons of values in surprisingly many situations. In the end, 3 mana 3 life for a spot removal isn't where you want to be. If we want to deal with enchantments/ artifacts, we want more specific efficient answers for those. If we want to deal with planeswalkers, Dreadbore is more relevant against the Liliana&Nahiri decks (think about it, there is nothing else to hit besides some creatures). I would only play Anguished Unmaking against Tron (where its flexibility actually pays off) but against any other deck, it's pretty awful.
Damnation in the main is a good idea. Mardu Control is a heavily reactive deck that does nothing for the first few turns. If your removals don't line up well against your opponent's proactive threats, you're going to lose. It can take too long to stabilize against the hyper aggro decks. Some decks like Eldrazi and Dredge couldn't care less about your removal spells. Damnation can buy you a lot of time and can actually give you a good chance of stabilizing. Speaking of Eldrazi and Dredge, it would not be a bad idea to run Anger of the Gods but you may need some filter lands for the double red mana.
Definitely has some weird choices. Like you said, it runs 4 colorless sources in a 3-color deck. Not a great idea. Not every deck that performs well competitively is necessarily an optimal build. However, it's still a traditional Mardu Control deck with the same basic strategy, only with some land disruption.
The thing is Jeskai inherently has more value than Mardu - that's Mardu's big weakness. Their manlands are better, they have snapcaster mage, and they have ancestral/ serum visions. This leads to a better long-game and they don't even need Nahiri to win. But Mardu has two big advantages over Jeskai: (1) black hand disruption outclasses blue counter-magic in modern as a diverse answer and (2) Lingering Souls vs Affinity, Infect, and any grinding decks. It's hard to say which is the better build. Can't say I love either.
I think your opponent will just wqrch you to lose to your manabase.
there's more blue symbols than red. I'd call the deck Esper-Red or 4 color control
Really Liked your write up for each card.
Slaughter Pact I have realized that it has it's moments when its not helpful. Like you said, it doesn't hit some heavy hitters including Siege Rhino. Also sometimes in the interactive match, you have more than 5 lands and you can afford to pay for to remove something and instead you just effect your next turn. The moment when you would rather have a path/terminate/dismember.
I ran Damnation in the mainboard. Loved it. Felt rough sometimes cause I personally run a bunch of 4 CMC already. But after your responce I plan to change my list up a bit.
Interesting list did do very well. Did he just get lucky? Sure the chance is small to reveal that Emrakul off Dark Confidant. My appoligies for not knowing the specific percent but when you multiply that number by number of games played in a round and then by the number of rounds. Emrakul will cost you a game or worse a match. When you need to go X-1 at a large event(X-2 maybe), it's just not worth it in my opinion. I'm sure there is a reason competitive Jund list don't play Tasigur.
Glad you enjoyed the analysis. And something like Siege Rhino is probably going to be more popular because some pros like Michael Majors and Willy Edel are (apparently) starting to assert that Abzan is once again better than Jund. So expect amateurs to jump on the bandwagon.
Running more 4-drops can definitely be a problem. That's the sacrifice you make by making Nahiri your win-con. Anger of the Gods is probably almost as good right now however, with the exile effect being essential in some match-ups (Dredge, CoCo).
The reason why Jund no longer needs Tasigur has more to do with the fact that Kalitas was printed. Most people didn't mind the nonbo with Bob before. And now that we have Grim Flayer, Jund has better creatures that don't interfere with Goyf's power.
The chance of hitting Emrakul is fairly low but as for the rest of the deck, a lot of it is definitely questionable.
Isn't too much effort to destroy a permanent?
Well you shouldn't be playing 4 Kolaghan's Command in the first place. But to answer your question, no. You have to consider the probability of drawing that combination while playing, while at the same time thinking about the probability of times this combo will be relevant. The strength of Mardu is being able to provide the best possible answers to a wide variety of things. Liquimetal Coating doesn't exactly play to those strengths.