I don't think that card is particularly good. When would you ever want that card in play?
Anytime you have a creature on the battlefield. Drop him turn 2, your mana dorks now cost 3 more life to remove. Everytime you pod a creature, he triggers.
Considering there's a very good chance pod doesn't actually win through the combo (or any combo), he either accelerates the beatdown plan by reducing your opponent's life, or he's giving you value by nullifying removal or pod sacrifices.
As an indestructible enchantment, he's hard to remove. If he becomes an indestructible creature, it likely means you have superior board position.
Sure, he gives your opponent the choice, but when both choices are accelerating your win-conditions, there's nothing to lose.
You never need a card to supplement Pod though. Pod is already our best card, you are weakening the deck if you are playing cards that only help make Pod better.
He is the classic Browbeat, sure both sides benefit you, but rarely will you get the side that you want benefit from at the time. There will be a few scenarios, as variance demands, where he will be the stone nuts, but the number of times he is simply overkill or a do-nothing will vastly out number the times he is relevant.
The other problem is you can't Pod OUT of him. Imagine a scenario where you have him and no other creatures but you have a Pod. Instead of a Kitchen Finks that might have survived the Supreme Verdict you now have a do-nothing enchantment. And yea, maybe your opponent took 12 damage wrathing you, but now they are in a superior board state despite you having a Birthing Pod.
The last problem as this card does nothing against the biggest tool to beat Pod, Anger of the Gods, since the creatures don't actually die, they are exiled.
Well, I am unsure if it would be mainboard or sideboard as a strat for some decks. It nerfs some traditional combo lines, but who knows... maybe Melira will be relegated to fighting Infect only.
If you take out Melira from the deck then you can only combo with Archangel since they'll never let the creature come back. So you'll basically lose the combo route while hoping that the oponent can't take advantage of your "do nothing on my own" 3-drop. Any card that can't affect the game alone needs to be really good and sinergistic with the deck, and we have enough of those cards as it is (Pod/Chord/Gavony). I don't know, maybe he is the nuts, but I'm very very sceptical.
You never need a card to supplement Pod though. Pod is already our best card, you are weakening the deck if you are playing cards that only help make Pod better.
He is the classic Browbeat, sure both sides benefit you, but rarely will you get the side that you want benefit from at the time. There will be a few scenarios, as variance demands, where he will be the stone nuts, but the number of times he is simply overkill or a do-nothing will vastly out number the times he is relevant.
The other problem is you can't Pod OUT of him. Imagine a scenario where you have him and no other creatures but you have a Pod. Instead of a Kitchen Finks that might have survived the Supreme Verdict you now have a do-nothing enchantment. And yea, maybe your opponent took 12 damage wrathing you, but now they are in a superior board state despite you having a Birthing Pod.
The last problem as this card does nothing against the biggest tool to beat Pod, Anger of the Gods, since the creatures don't actually die, they are exiled.
He's going to be a 1-of in a deck that runs 28 creatures. There's no way Kitchen Finks is going to be the card that goes out for him.
He doesn't jam persist, so basically he's going to replace a card that doesn't recover from a wrath by itself anyway, and any other persist creature you control will still return to the battlefield anyway.
Not every card in Pod currently exists to deal with grave hate / anger of the gods. Athreos could replace one of them.
If you take out Melira from the deck then you can only combo with Archangel since they'll never let the creature come back. So you'll basically lose the combo route while hoping that the oponent can't take advantage of your "do nothing on my own" 3-drop. Any card that can't affect the game alone needs to be really good and sinergistic with the deck, and we have enough of those cards as it is (Pod/Chord/Gavony). I don't know, maybe he is the nuts, but I'm very very sceptical.
I would definitely consider running Pod with just Archangel/Spike Feeder combo and some utility lands like Gavony Township and run it like a super resilient midrange deck.
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My Modern decks: B/R/G Living End G/R/B G/R Tron R/G U/W/G/R Gargageddon R/G/W/U R/W/G Naya Burn G/W/R
3-2 is pretty respectable. And from watching people play pod, I think that a lot of people get too hung up on the combo aspect of Melira Pod rather than just playing it as powerful midrange deck with powerful tutors and a combo out if you need it.
If I played very well and was 3-2, I would be fine with it. But the fact that I could have played better upsets me even if I haven't played the deck since the inception of Modern. In my testing, I would win with the Combo about 33% of the time. This tournament had 7 wins with 0 Combo.
Honestly looking back, I probably would not have beaten the Kiki Pod (but it is a defeatist attitude) because he did have a good hand and it seemingly has a good matchup in the quasi-mirror. But, I feel if I played better, I should have beaten Affinity. It would have taken very precise plays though since Cranial Plating + Etched Champions are somewhat tough. Looking back at the rounds that I won, I won round 1 off of sheer outdrawing my opponent. I can respect that in rounds 4 and 5, I only slightly outdrew my opponents, so I needed some technical play. But still, I really had the upper hand with discard. It was on me to make the right or wrong choice. I did get very lucky in Sideboarded games drawing Sin Collector throughout the night, especially turn 2 Sin Collector.
By the way, a question for all of you. In round 4, game 2, I played Sin Collector on turn 2 to see a hand of Wrath of God, Timely Reinforcements, Path to Exile, Snapcaster Mage and 2 lands. He had a tapped Hallowed Fountain in play. I had BoP and then cast Sin Collector with Pod in hand. What would you take? Then I played Pod and Podded for Entomber Exarch. What would you take then? He had a freshly drawn Path to Exile.
In the 1st case, I exiled Path to Exile with my Sin Collector since he couldn't flash it back with Snappy. In the 2nd choice, I took Timely Reinforcements because we were getting low on time and I could see SCM + Timely Reinforcements a few turns after Timely Reinforcements being tough and I had some resiliency to Wrath of God in my hand. (Voice of Resurgence)
I can really echo your sentiments about the deck, I've even posted about it in this thread before. I played Melira Pod almost exclusively for the last few months and the amount of "do nothing" hands we keep and just hope will get there is absurd to me considering this is touted as one of the hardest decks to play in the format. It can involve a lot of decision making, but more often than that you don't have a Birthing Pod in play and you're just living off the top of your deck trying to make do with a bunch of situationally poor creatures. It's too bad because I love the toolbox style of play and the deck is a blast in the few games were a Pod does resolve. In the other 80% of games I played though, I just felt like I was at the mercy of my deck.
To answer your discard question, knowing you had Voice in hand I think Path was definitely the right pick. If I'm reading that right you played the Exarch on turn three and your opponent had two lands in play with only one in hand? In this situation I would take the land. It's a gamble but if he misses the next land drop his only play is Path to Exile. If he Paths your Exarch you just got a 3 for 1. If he Paths Voice you essentially get a 3 for 1 as well (his path, token, basic land for Voice). Even if he does hit the land and goes Path then Snapcaster -> Path you've generated way too much value for him to come back from. Wrath isn't great against your deck, nor is Reinforcements since you can pod Voice into Pontiff to clear tokens if necessary or use it to lower your life so he doesn't gain any. You don't really need to be in a rush to win since pod is going to inevitably win the value game. The next best choice would be Snapcaster in my opinion which Exarch unfortunately can't hit.
For a change of pace I decided to play TarmoTwin this weekend and ended up taking the tournament down for my first 1st place in modern. I know they are both top tier decks, but TarmoTwin really feels like it's in a different league to me thanks to all the consistency of cantrips, redundancy, and much better ability to shift between the tempo and combo angles. It utilizes very similar skills to what you use playing Pod, but applies them to what just seem like much stronger strategies. Maybe the deck just fits my playstyle better as I'm a blue player at heart.
Hello everyone. I am about to assemble this deck and I am very stoked about it. Looks like so much fun to play.
On quick question: I have 2 Misty Rainforests, 4 Verdant Catacombs, 2 Marsh Flats. Is this an acceptable Fetch base for now? It seems that the Marsh Flats can fetch anything Misty could.
Preemptive thanks to whoever responds.
Hello everyone. I am about to assemble this deck and I am very stoked about it. Looks like so much fun to play.
On quick question: I have 2 Misty Rainforests, 4 Verdant Catacombs, 2 Marsh Flats. Is this an acceptable Fetch base for now? It seems that the Marsh Flats can fetch anything Misty could.
Preemptive thanks to whoever responds.
I would certainly think this is more than acceptable for your fetchlands. While Marsh Flats does fetch all of your lands, the reason Misty Rainforest is played over it is basically just because it can fetch for a turn 1 forest for your mana dorks in matchups where your life total is under pressure. If you find yourself playing in a meta where this is a problem, you could probably just cut the two Marsh Flats for another Forest, and a 4th Razorverge Thicket (some lists only run 3). 8 fetches isn't quite as necessary as it used to be in the deck, since we don't get to play with Deathrite Shaman anymore.
But if that isn't the case, I see no real problem with running the 2 Flats.
I would certainly think this is more than acceptable for your fetchlands. While Marsh Flats does fetch all of your lands, the reason Misty Rainforest is played over it is basically just because it can fetch for a turn 1 forest for your mana dorks in matchups where your life total is under pressure. If you find yourself playing in a meta where this is a problem, you could probably just cut the two Marsh Flats for another Forest, and a 4th Razorverge Thicket (some lists only run 3). 8 fetches isn't quite as necessary as it used to be in the deck, since we don't get to play with Deathrite Shaman anymore.
But if that isn't the case, I see no real problem with running the 2 Flats.
Thanks for the clarification. My next question is why should I play this over Kiki-pod? I have heard it is better because you only need Kiki and Resto Angel to make the combo. I personally am pumped to play Abrupt Decay and Thoughtseize but I was wondering if there were any other reasons for playing on deck over the other.
Also, I was wondering what kind of match-ups Orzhov Pontiff is good for?
Thanks for the clarification. My next question is why should I play this over Kiki-pod? I have heard it is better because you only need Kiki and Resto Angel to make the combo. I personally am pumped to play Abrupt Decay and Thoughtseize but I was wondering if there were any other reasons for playing on deck over the other.
Also, I was wondering what kind of match-ups Orzhov Pontiff is good for?
I find that Twin Pod's beatdown plan is better against midrange and Tron, but Melira Pod's beatdown plan is better against control (e.g. UWR Control, Cruel Control) because it plays fewer mana dorks and more 2+/X's. I also find that Melira Pod has the better combo match-up because of its access to targeted discard (and its better-against-no-board-presence beatdown plan). Melira Pod is also substantially better against Infect because of Melira. Because of its substantially higher Persist and Murderous Redcap count (and often Voice of Resurgence count), Melira Pod's Faeries match-up is even better than Twin Pod's.
Orzhov Pontiff is good if you expect to see a lot of X/1's and/or their X/1's are crucial. I wouldn't board it out against Twin (especially Tempo Twin variants) or Pod (killing mana dorks is good), and I'd definitely board it in against Tokens, Affinity, Faeries, Delver, and Elves.
We have no way to tutor for MoA.. just like Escort & loxodon, we need it in our opening 7. We can play around anger until we get a forge tender, and chording for 1 to get it isn't that hard to do. T1 birds, turn 2 whatever, and by t3 we have chord for forge tender. Even 3 lands and 1 creature lets us chord for it.
MoA seems good in thought, but the strength of pod is that we can get any creature based answer whenever we want, and MOA isn't a creature based answer.
What do we think of eidolon of rhetoric? 1 spell per turn would hamper our opponents far more than us.
Also, has anyone tried meddling mage? Blue make its hard to hardcast but potentially useful.
What do we think of eidolon of rhetoric? 1 spell per turn would hamper our opponents far more than us.
Also, has anyone tried meddling mage? Blue make its hard to hardcast but potentially useful.
I updated the primer to include Eidolon of Rhetoric (among other cards). Heck yes, I am dodging UR Storm's sideboard removal with this guy.
What do we think of eidolon of rhetoric? 1 spell per turn would hamper our opponents far more than us.
Also, has anyone tried meddling mage? Blue make its hard to hardcast but potentially useful.
4 toughness doesn't seem worth the extra turn needed to chord it. It's also easier to pod 1-2 than 2-3 in most lists since there's usually more 1 drops.
I am more of a standard player but really like this deck. My LGS is getting a bit more into modern and I'd like to play this deck, but don't want to drop a ton of money on lands. I have all of the lands except the fetches (I own like 1 Marsh Flats lol). Would it be alright to play without those, or are they really needed? Since Deathrite Shaman is banned I'd imagine they aren't as needed (but still very good obviously).
Overall I don't want to drop to much money on the deck. I have most of the creatures. Whats the most essential stuff in the deck to really make it work overall? (eg a budget melira pod). This may not be the best place to discuss this but I figured I'd ask those who have experience with the deck itself.
You are in luck as i have just been running a budget version of the deck while waiting on some of the cards to be delivered: shocks in place of fetches, arbor elves instead of hierarchs and strstranglerootangleroot geists innstead voices.
Fetches are not 100% needed, but the deck just runs so much more smoothly it's not even contest. Life total is a concern in some matches (depends heavily on meta ofc) and being able to fetch for basic is always nice. You probably could run more checklands or filters, but not having untapped mana source t1 for dork is real concern.
Hierarchs are a must. While arbor elf is neat substitute with shockland heavy mabase, the exalted is actually very relevant (is a factor in about 10% games from my xp)
Geists were actually pretty good to me, but being able to reset the pod chain with voice token is something that should not be underestimated.
I am more of a standard player but really like this deck. My LGS is getting a bit more into modern and I'd like to play this deck, but don't want to drop a ton of money on lands. I have all of the lands except the fetches (I own like 1 Marsh Flats lol). Would it be alright to play without those, or are they really needed? Since Deathrite Shaman is banned I'd imagine they aren't as needed (but still very good obviously).
Overall I don't want to drop to much money on the deck. I have most of the creatures. Whats the most essential stuff in the deck to really make it work overall? (eg a budget melira pod). This may not be the best place to discuss this but I figured I'd ask those who have experience with the deck itself.
I'm just listing the expensive stuff
Get 4 Pod, 4 Finks, 4 Birds, shock lands, Linvala, and some Voices first.
Then 4 Thoughtseize, 2-3 Abrupt Decay, 2-3 Chords.
From this on just get the remaining cards one at a time. Fetches and Hierarchs are not really necessary but essencial to optimize the deck.
A budget manabase was discussed some pages back.
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Anytime you have a creature on the battlefield. Drop him turn 2, your mana dorks now cost 3 more life to remove. Everytime you pod a creature, he triggers.
Considering there's a very good chance pod doesn't actually win through the combo (or any combo), he either accelerates the beatdown plan by reducing your opponent's life, or he's giving you value by nullifying removal or pod sacrifices.
As an indestructible enchantment, he's hard to remove. If he becomes an indestructible creature, it likely means you have superior board position.
Sure, he gives your opponent the choice, but when both choices are accelerating your win-conditions, there's nothing to lose.
He is the classic Browbeat, sure both sides benefit you, but rarely will you get the side that you want benefit from at the time. There will be a few scenarios, as variance demands, where he will be the stone nuts, but the number of times he is simply overkill or a do-nothing will vastly out number the times he is relevant.
The other problem is you can't Pod OUT of him. Imagine a scenario where you have him and no other creatures but you have a Pod. Instead of a Kitchen Finks that might have survived the Supreme Verdict you now have a do-nothing enchantment. And yea, maybe your opponent took 12 damage wrathing you, but now they are in a superior board state despite you having a Birthing Pod.
The last problem as this card does nothing against the biggest tool to beat Pod, Anger of the Gods, since the creatures don't actually die, they are exiled.
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I have Grafdiggers Cage and Hibernation. Any others? How effective is Anger of the Gods?
Anything I am missing? Torpor Orb?
decks playing:
none
If you take out Melira from the deck then you can only combo with Archangel since they'll never let the creature come back. So you'll basically lose the combo route while hoping that the oponent can't take advantage of your "do nothing on my own" 3-drop. Any card that can't affect the game alone needs to be really good and sinergistic with the deck, and we have enough of those cards as it is (Pod/Chord/Gavony). I don't know, maybe he is the nuts, but I'm very very sceptical.
He's going to be a 1-of in a deck that runs 28 creatures. There's no way Kitchen Finks is going to be the card that goes out for him.
He doesn't jam persist, so basically he's going to replace a card that doesn't recover from a wrath by itself anyway, and any other persist creature you control will still return to the battlefield anyway.
Not every card in Pod currently exists to deal with grave hate / anger of the gods. Athreos could replace one of them.
I would definitely consider running Pod with just Archangel/Spike Feeder combo and some utility lands like Gavony Township and run it like a super resilient midrange deck.
My Modern decks:
B/R/G Living End G/R/B
G/R Tron R/G
U/W/G/R Gargageddon R/G/W/U
R/W/G Naya Burn G/W/R
I can really echo your sentiments about the deck, I've even posted about it in this thread before. I played Melira Pod almost exclusively for the last few months and the amount of "do nothing" hands we keep and just hope will get there is absurd to me considering this is touted as one of the hardest decks to play in the format. It can involve a lot of decision making, but more often than that you don't have a Birthing Pod in play and you're just living off the top of your deck trying to make do with a bunch of situationally poor creatures. It's too bad because I love the toolbox style of play and the deck is a blast in the few games were a Pod does resolve. In the other 80% of games I played though, I just felt like I was at the mercy of my deck.
To answer your discard question, knowing you had Voice in hand I think Path was definitely the right pick. If I'm reading that right you played the Exarch on turn three and your opponent had two lands in play with only one in hand? In this situation I would take the land. It's a gamble but if he misses the next land drop his only play is Path to Exile. If he Paths your Exarch you just got a 3 for 1. If he Paths Voice you essentially get a 3 for 1 as well (his path, token, basic land for Voice). Even if he does hit the land and goes Path then Snapcaster -> Path you've generated way too much value for him to come back from. Wrath isn't great against your deck, nor is Reinforcements since you can pod Voice into Pontiff to clear tokens if necessary or use it to lower your life so he doesn't gain any. You don't really need to be in a rush to win since pod is going to inevitably win the value game. The next best choice would be Snapcaster in my opinion which Exarch unfortunately can't hit.
For a change of pace I decided to play TarmoTwin this weekend and ended up taking the tournament down for my first 1st place in modern. I know they are both top tier decks, but TarmoTwin really feels like it's in a different league to me thanks to all the consistency of cantrips, redundancy, and much better ability to shift between the tempo and combo angles. It utilizes very similar skills to what you use playing Pod, but applies them to what just seem like much stronger strategies. Maybe the deck just fits my playstyle better as I'm a blue player at heart.
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On quick question: I have 2 Misty Rainforests, 4 Verdant Catacombs, 2 Marsh Flats. Is this an acceptable Fetch base for now? It seems that the Marsh Flats can fetch anything Misty could.
Preemptive thanks to whoever responds.
I would certainly think this is more than acceptable for your fetchlands. While Marsh Flats does fetch all of your lands, the reason Misty Rainforest is played over it is basically just because it can fetch for a turn 1 forest for your mana dorks in matchups where your life total is under pressure. If you find yourself playing in a meta where this is a problem, you could probably just cut the two Marsh Flats for another Forest, and a 4th Razorverge Thicket (some lists only run 3). 8 fetches isn't quite as necessary as it used to be in the deck, since we don't get to play with Deathrite Shaman anymore.
But if that isn't the case, I see no real problem with running the 2 Flats.
Thanks for the clarification. My next question is why should I play this over Kiki-pod? I have heard it is better because you only need Kiki and Resto Angel to make the combo. I personally am pumped to play Abrupt Decay and Thoughtseize but I was wondering if there were any other reasons for playing on deck over the other.
Also, I was wondering what kind of match-ups Orzhov Pontiff is good for?
I find that Twin Pod's beatdown plan is better against midrange and Tron, but Melira Pod's beatdown plan is better against control (e.g. UWR Control, Cruel Control) because it plays fewer mana dorks and more 2+/X's. I also find that Melira Pod has the better combo match-up because of its access to targeted discard (and its better-against-no-board-presence beatdown plan). Melira Pod is also substantially better against Infect because of Melira. Because of its substantially higher Persist and Murderous Redcap count (and often Voice of Resurgence count), Melira Pod's Faeries match-up is even better than Twin Pod's.
Orzhov Pontiff is good if you expect to see a lot of X/1's and/or their X/1's are crucial. I wouldn't board it out against Twin (especially Tempo Twin variants) or Pod (killing mana dorks is good), and I'd definitely board it in against Tokens, Affinity, Faeries, Delver, and Elves.
Erebos B | Ghost Council WB | Grimgrin UB | Jhoira UR
Jor Kadeen RW | Melek UR | Mimeoplasm GUB | Rasputin WU
Savra BG | Sisay GW | Teneb BGW | Thada Adel U | Wort BR
I draft and play EDH. If a Standard player can't understand who a card is for, it's probably for me.
I also write things about good films.
MoA seems good in thought, but the strength of pod is that we can get any creature based answer whenever we want, and MOA isn't a creature based answer.
Also, has anyone tried meddling mage? Blue make its hard to hardcast but potentially useful.
I updated the primer to include Eidolon of Rhetoric (among other cards). Heck yes, I am dodging UR Storm's sideboard removal with this guy.
We haven't tried Meddling Mage, probably because the blue mana is a pain and it dies to a lot of removal that combo tends to pack (such as Bolt, Flame Slash, Anger of the Gods, Firespout...).
Isn't Eidolon of Rhetoric just a worse Ethersworn Canonist?
4 toughness doesn't seem worth the extra turn needed to chord it. It's also easier to pod 1-2 than 2-3 in most lists since there's usually more 1 drops.
I am more of a standard player but really like this deck. My LGS is getting a bit more into modern and I'd like to play this deck, but don't want to drop a ton of money on lands. I have all of the lands except the fetches (I own like 1 Marsh Flats lol). Would it be alright to play without those, or are they really needed? Since Deathrite Shaman is banned I'd imagine they aren't as needed (but still very good obviously).
Overall I don't want to drop to much money on the deck. I have most of the creatures. Whats the most essential stuff in the deck to really make it work overall? (eg a budget melira pod). This may not be the best place to discuss this but I figured I'd ask those who have experience with the deck itself.
Melira Pod - Modern
Fetches are not 100% needed, but the deck just runs so much more smoothly it's not even contest. Life total is a concern in some matches (depends heavily on meta ofc) and being able to fetch for basic is always nice. You probably could run more checklands or filters, but not having untapped mana source t1 for dork is real concern.
Hierarchs are a must. While arbor elf is neat substitute with shockland heavy mabase, the exalted is actually very relevant (is a factor in about 10% games from my xp)
Geists were actually pretty good to me, but being able to reset the pod chain with voice token is something that should not be underestimated.
You NEED the full tutor package. No contest.
I'm just listing the expensive stuff
Get 4 Pod, 4 Finks, 4 Birds, shock lands, Linvala, and some Voices first.
Then 4 Thoughtseize, 2-3 Abrupt Decay, 2-3 Chords.
From this on just get the remaining cards one at a time. Fetches and Hierarchs are not really necessary but essencial to optimize the deck.
A budget manabase was discussed some pages back.