I've been playing tron for a long time, almost fully foiled out deck actually, and while I love the look of Ugin, and want to test him, I feel that the cost of 8 vs 7 would be huge, not being able to drop him turn 3 (unless something was path'd as another user said). Has anyone encountered issues with this? I see some lists dropping pyros and firespouts. Is this something we should be doing now? I know in the past having those main have saved me in g1 affinity matchups, and help to take out early game rampers for opponents, and perhaps even bobs etc now.
4 Ugin: This is the big one. Ugin is a bomb; he's like a Karn that costs 8 mana, albeit being slightly different. We would definitely run 8 Karns at the cost of the latter 4 costing 8 mana, so why don't we? I still think O-Stone's likely better, but again this is in addition to, and not in lieu of those cards.
I think I'm going to report your account as hacked to the moderators.
I know, I can't believe I'm saying it myself. But I've just been so unimpressed with Pyroclasm in this metagame. Unless you feel like you're specifically going to be facing against Affinity on a given day, it just feels so insufficient. The only creature not run by Affinity that Pyroclasm hits is Dark Confidant, or an unboosted merfolk lord (unlikely in that matchup). Nobody runs mana dorks, nobody runs creatures in Zoo with less than 3 toughness. It hits Snapcaster Mages, but if I'm playing Pyroclasm to sweep the board of Snapcaster Mage, it's not exactly where I want to be.
In all of the above matchups (except perhaps Affinity), Spellskite is better, especially when you can back it up with 1 of 8 planeswalkers in 1-2 turns.
Ugin's a lot worse than Karn, and a lot worse than Oblivion Stone. But he's simultaneously a lot better than Pyroclasm in 75-80% of our matchups.
I used to see opening hands with Pyroclasm and go "Great, I can't wait to blow my opponent out on turn 2!" Nowadays when I see Pyroclasm, my immediate response is "I can't wait to board this out in Game 2 - let's see what the rest of this hand looks like." And if it's gotten to that point, I'd much rather see Spellskite, which I find myself sideboarding in in 70% of our matchups instead of sideboarding out. If our goal is still for our MD to give us the maximum power against the maximum amount of the metagame, we don't want to be playing to the Affinities - we want to be playing to all of our MUs. And even if Affinity's one of our worse MUs, so is Twin (where Spellskite is a lot better than Pyroclasm, and even Ugin is slightly better), Burn (where Pyroclasm is dead against even Monastery Swiftspear), Bogles (where Spellskite is again a lot better than Pyroclasm), Scapeshift (where Pyroclasm is useless), and the mirror (where Pyroclasm is also useless).
I even like it more against BGx. Sure, Dark Confidant is a great source of card advantage. But it's not going to be swinging through a Spellskite, and their spells don't matter if we buy the time we need to get to our endgame.
Maybe Sundering Titan would be better in Ugin's spot (though I've honestly liked Ugin a lot better)? Maybe cycling Relics is a lot better than I give them credit for? Either way, I've been so unimpressed by Pyroclasm that I'm officially moving it to the SB - where I can bring it in for the matchups it shines in, instead of just having dead cards in my MD.
I've been playing tron for a long time, almost fully foiled out deck actually, and while I love the look of Ugin, and want to test him, I feel that the cost of 8 vs 7 would be huge, not being able to drop him turn 3 (unless something was path'd as another user said). Has anyone encountered issues with this? I see some lists dropping pyros and firespouts. Is this something we should be doing now? I know in the past having those main have saved me in g1 affinity matchups, and help to take out early game rampers for opponents, and perhaps even bobs etc now.
Nobody runs mana dorks anymore, and I'd honestly much rather have Ugin than Pyroclasm against decks running Bob (even if it is slower). I love having MD Pyroclasms if I'm expecting to play Affinity, but I also love having MD Combusts if I'm expecting Twin, or MD Slaughter Games if I'm expecting Scapeshift.
Decks Pyroclasm is good against honestly occupy such a narrow slice of the meta that I don't actively want to see it in most of my games - which is why I want to run something else in its place. I like Spellskite for a start, but I'd also like another board sweeper for all these decks going bigger than 2 toughness. Ugin doesn't cost that much more mana than Firespout (as funny as that sounds), and hits a lot more cards like Rhinos and Anafenzas, as well as noncreature nonland permanents.
I still think the card's not that great in metas where Pyroclasm is good, but I do think it's really good in some metas where Pyroclasm is bad.
I've run Mindslaver-Tron in metas where Pyroclasm's been bad in the past, but Ugin's better than Mindslaver in fulfilling the role that Pyroclasm can't.
Maybe this is all insane ravings that I'll regret in a couple of days or weeks, but Ugin seems really good now that all the decks that Pyroclasm was good against are banned. Affinity's going to have to be extremely popular to justify what are in essence 3 MD hate cards. It would be like a BGx deck MDing Stony Silence to hit the Tron MU; it just sounds ridiculous.
4 Ugin: This is the big one. Ugin is a bomb; he's like a Karn that costs 8 mana, albeit being slightly different. We would definitely run 8 Karns at the cost of the latter 4 costing 8 mana, so why don't we? I still think O-Stone's likely better, but again this is in addition to, and not in lieu of those cards.
I think I'm going to report your account as hacked to the moderators.
I know, I can't believe I'm saying it myself. But I've just been so unimpressed with Pyroclasm in this metagame. Unless you feel like you're specifically going to be facing against Affinity on a given day, it just feels so insufficient. The only creature not run by Affinity that Pyroclasm hits is Dark Confidant, or an unboosted merfolk lord (unlikely in that matchup). Nobody runs mana dorks, nobody runs creatures in Zoo with less than 3 toughness. It hits Snapcaster Mages, but if I'm playing Pyroclasm to sweep the board of Snapcaster Mage, it's not exactly where I want to be.
In all of the above matchups (except perhaps Affinity), Spellskite is better, especially when you can back it up with 1 of 8 planeswalkers in 1-2 turns.
Ugin's a lot worse than Karn, and a lot worse than Oblivion Stone. But he's simultaneously a lot better than Pyroclasm in 75-80% of our matchups.
I used to see opening hands with Pyroclasm and go "Great, I can't wait to blow my opponent out on turn 2!" Nowadays when I see Pyroclasm, my immediate response is "I can't wait to board this out in Game 2 - let's see what the rest of this hand looks like." And if it's gotten to that point, I'd much rather see Spellskite, which I find myself sideboarding in in 70% of our matchups instead of sideboarding out. If our goal is still for our MD to give us the maximum power against the maximum amount of the metagame, we don't want to be playing to the Affinities - we want to be playing to all of our MUs. And even if Affinity's one of our worse MUs, so is Twin (where Spellskite is a lot better than Pyroclasm, and even Ugin is slightly better), Burn (where Pyroclasm is dead against even Monastery Swiftspear), Bogles (where Spellskite is again a lot better than Pyroclasm), Scapeshift (where Pyroclasm is useless), and the mirror (where Pyroclasm is also useless).
I even like it more against BGx. Sure, Dark Confidant is a great source of card advantage. But it's not going to be swinging through a Spellskite, and their spells don't matter if we buy the time we need to get to our endgame.
Maybe Sundering Titan would be better in Ugin's spot (though I've honestly liked Ugin a lot better)? Maybe cycling Relics is a lot better than I give them credit for? Either way, I've been so unimpressed by Pyroclasm that I'm officially moving it to the SB - where I can bring it in for the matchups it shines in, instead of just having dead cards in my MD.
I've been playing tron for a long time, almost fully foiled out deck actually, and while I love the look of Ugin, and want to test him, I feel that the cost of 8 vs 7 would be huge, not being able to drop him turn 3 (unless something was path'd as another user said). Has anyone encountered issues with this? I see some lists dropping pyros and firespouts. Is this something we should be doing now? I know in the past having those main have saved me in g1 affinity matchups, and help to take out early game rampers for opponents, and perhaps even bobs etc now.
Nobody runs mana dorks anymore, and I'd honestly much rather have Ugin than Pyroclasm against decks running Bob (even if it is slower). I love having MD Pyroclasms if I'm expecting to play Affinity, but I also love having MD Combusts if I'm expecting Twin, or MD Slaughter Games if I'm expecting Scapeshift.
Decks Pyroclasm is good against honestly occupy such a narrow slice of the meta that I don't actively want to see it in most of my games - which is why I want to run something else in its place. I like Spellskite for a start, but I'd also like another board sweeper for all these decks going bigger than 2 toughness. Ugin doesn't cost that much more mana than Firespout (as funny as that sounds), and hits a lot more cards like Rhinos and Anafenzas, as well as noncreature nonland permanents.
I still think the card's not that great in metas where Pyroclasm is good, but I do think it's really good in some metas where Pyroclasm is bad.
I've run Mindslaver-Tron in metas where Pyroclasm's been bad in the past, but Ugin's better than Mindslaver in fulfilling the role that Pyroclasm can't.
Maybe this is all insane ravings that I'll regret in a couple of days or weeks, but Ugin seems really good now that all the decks that Pyroclasm was good against are banned. Affinity's going to have to be extremely popular to justify what are in essence 3 MD hate cards. It would be like a BGx deck MDing Stony Silence to hit the Tron MU; it just sounds ridiculous.
I totally agree with Pyroclasm feeling extremely underwhelming this week. Against zoo it's (almost) dead - most of there guys are 2/3. Near useless versus infect (I say near as it does clear there t1 guy on your t2), only decent against affinity and only very early. Honestly, the biggest problem from affinity is the man lands. Having said all of that, I don't think Ugin is the answer. It does what we want but can be too late against the hyper aggressive decks if we dont curve out well with the tron pieces. I feel like we still need a low casting cost sweeper/removal of some sort. I'm going to have to pore through the gatherer and see if anything jumps out at me.
I dropped to 3 pyroclasm because I felt that drawing more than one (like ever) was resulting in game losses as they just stuck in my hand and did nothing.
I kept them in the deck mostly because in a fairly unknown metagame (as it still is) it's worth hitting unknown fast strategies which would otherwise run us over. Bogles and affinity both are a concern.
However I can see the merits of dropping them in favour of 3x spellskite and running a full set of them in order to provide a similar "roadblock" function for easier mana, and also as a bonus completely switch off certain strategies. The logic is there and i'm on board basically.
As foR ugin..... WeLl I'm running 2 and while I can see going to three, (and probably will), i don't think 4 is an option. It means cuttinG ulamog, maybe a single o-stone, and cutting down on cantrips as well. I don't want to upset the balance of cantrip-to-bomb.
Good discussion though. I feel like we learnt more in the last page than we have in weeks.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: G Tron, Vannifar, Jund, Druid/Vizier combo, Humans, Eldrazi Stompy (Serum Powder), Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Breach Titan, Turns, Eternal Command, As Foretold Living End, Elves, Cheerios, RUG Scapeshift
Fair points, I will have to test it. I do know affinity is popular in my meta, but I may make adjustments
Don't take my word for gold, I just found the idea kind of fanciful given that we can maximize the O-Stone effects with the dead space I had from Pyroclasm. If your meta's Affinity-heavy, I definitely wouldn't feel bad about running 3-4 MD. The big question is how much of the meta has to be Affinity at the SCG/GP-level in order to justify Pyroclasm's existence over other options?
After playing with Ugin, I absolutely love him. Additionally, I really dislike Pyroclasm right now; I feel the only deck that it hits hard is Affinity, and maindecking Affinity hate is as weird as maindecking Combust (which kills Rhinos and Anafenzas).
Here's the 75 I'm running right now. It's really, REALLY greedy, but I'll explain my choices below.
...
Though it's greedy and I don't like running this much fatties, I do like your reasoning. The problem I see is against land destruction; so many cards in your deck are turned off. You managed to keep Oblivion Stone in though, so this list does appeal to me.. I'll have to ponder on this, thanks for sharing!
I certainly wouldn't run an Ulamog in a list with 4 Ugins, but hey.
Yeah, LD makes casting Ugins hard - but on the plus side, it's still easy to use them through Stony Silence (assuming they didn't disrupt your Expedition Map T2 on the play). I still feel Blood Moon's pretty acceptable though (thanks to the retaining of 4 O-Stone). And if you feel the Fulminator Mages coming from Junk for G2, you can just board them all out for Nature's Claims and Combusts. Ulamog's probably a little excessive, but I've always liked the option of tutoring him via Eye, and I don't know what I'd replace him with (maybe Spellskite #4?) I still like how he's an uncounterable LD trigger vs Scapeshift (and am still not a huge Titan fan for the fact that the MUs it's the best in are the ones where it's countered the most).
4 Ugin: This is the big one. Ugin is a bomb; he's like a Karn that costs 8 mana, albeit being slightly different. We would definitely run 8 Karns at the cost of the latter 4 costing 8 mana, so why don't we? I still think O-Stone's likely better, but again this is in addition to, and not in lieu of those cards.
I think I'm going to report your account as hacked to the moderators.
I know, I can't believe I'm saying it myself. But I've just been so unimpressed with Pyroclasm in this metagame. Unless you feel like you're specifically going to be facing against Affinity on a given day, it just feels so insufficient. The only creature not run by Affinity that Pyroclasm hits is Dark Confidant, or an unboosted merfolk lord (unlikely in that matchup). Nobody runs mana dorks, nobody runs creatures in Zoo with less than 3 toughness. It hits Snapcaster Mages, but if I'm playing Pyroclasm to sweep the board of Snapcaster Mage, it's not exactly where I want to be.
In all of the above matchups (except perhaps Affinity), Spellskite is better, especially when you can back it up with 1 of 8 planeswalkers in 1-2 turns.
Ugin's a lot worse than Karn, and a lot worse than Oblivion Stone. But he's simultaneously a lot better than Pyroclasm in 75-80% of our matchups.
I used to see opening hands with Pyroclasm and go "Great, I can't wait to blow my opponent out on turn 2!" Nowadays when I see Pyroclasm, my immediate response is "I can't wait to board this out in Game 2 - let's see what the rest of this hand looks like." And if it's gotten to that point, I'd much rather see Spellskite, which I find myself sideboarding in in 70% of our matchups instead of sideboarding out. If our goal is still for our MD to give us the maximum power against the maximum amount of the metagame, we don't want to be playing to the Affinities - we want to be playing to all of our MUs. And even if Affinity's one of our worse MUs, so is Twin (where Spellskite is a lot better than Pyroclasm, and even Ugin is slightly better), Burn (where Pyroclasm is dead against even Monastery Swiftspear), Bogles (where Spellskite is again a lot better than Pyroclasm), Scapeshift (where Pyroclasm is useless), and the mirror (where Pyroclasm is also useless).
I even like it more against BGx. Sure, Dark Confidant is a great source of card advantage. But it's not going to be swinging through a Spellskite, and their spells don't matter if we buy the time we need to get to our endgame.
Maybe Sundering Titan would be better in Ugin's spot (though I've honestly liked Ugin a lot better)? Maybe cycling Relics is a lot better than I give them credit for? Either way, I've been so unimpressed by Pyroclasm that I'm officially moving it to the SB - where I can bring it in for the matchups it shines in, instead of just having dead cards in my MD.
I've been playing tron for a long time, almost fully foiled out deck actually, and while I love the look of Ugin, and want to test him, I feel that the cost of 8 vs 7 would be huge, not being able to drop him turn 3 (unless something was path'd as another user said). Has anyone encountered issues with this? I see some lists dropping pyros and firespouts. Is this something we should be doing now? I know in the past having those main have saved me in g1 affinity matchups, and help to take out early game rampers for opponents, and perhaps even bobs etc now.
Nobody runs mana dorks anymore, and I'd honestly much rather have Ugin than Pyroclasm against decks running Bob (even if it is slower). I love having MD Pyroclasms if I'm expecting to play Affinity, but I also love having MD Combusts if I'm expecting Twin, or MD Slaughter Games if I'm expecting Scapeshift.
Decks Pyroclasm is good against honestly occupy such a narrow slice of the meta that I don't actively want to see it in most of my games - which is why I want to run something else in its place. I like Spellskite for a start, but I'd also like another board sweeper for all these decks going bigger than 2 toughness. Ugin doesn't cost that much more mana than Firespout (as funny as that sounds), and hits a lot more cards like Rhinos and Anafenzas, as well as noncreature nonland permanents.
I still think the card's not that great in metas where Pyroclasm is good, but I do think it's really good in some metas where Pyroclasm is bad.
I've run Mindslaver-Tron in metas where Pyroclasm's been bad in the past, but Ugin's better than Mindslaver in fulfilling the role that Pyroclasm can't.
Maybe this is all insane ravings that I'll regret in a couple of days or weeks, but Ugin seems really good now that all the decks that Pyroclasm was good against are banned. Affinity's going to have to be extremely popular to justify what are in essence 3 MD hate cards. It would be like a BGx deck MDing Stony Silence to hit the Tron MU; it just sounds ridiculous.
I totally agree with Pyroclasm feeling extremely underwhelming this week. Against zoo it's (almost) dead - most of there guys are 2/3. Near useless versus infect (I say near as it does clear there t1 guy on your t2), only decent against affinity and only very early. Honestly, the biggest problem from affinity is the man lands. Having said all of that, I don't think Ugin is the answer. It does what we want but can be too late against the hyper aggressive decks if we dont curve out well with the tron pieces. I feel like we still need a low casting cost sweeper/removal of some sort. I'm going to have to pore through the gatherer and see if anything jumps out at me.
I think the bigger takeaway is that Spellskite feels a ton better than Pyroclasm right now. It's as good/better in all the MUs that Pyroclasm is good in (except maybe Affinity), and it's absolutely stellar in some MUs that Pyroclasm was/is useless in (Zoo, etc). I feel it's pretty strong. Now, I don't know if 1 Emrakul 1 Ugin 3 Wurmcoil 4 Ugin 4 Karn 4 O-Stone is really where we want to be in terms of the rest of the deck, but I think that you could 1-for-1 convert Pyroclasms to Spellskites in most lists and see an improvement in the new meta. I think that Relic could potentially be worse now that you can't kill their Goyfs as they shrink to 0/1 (and they grow rather fast from there, especially if they somehow get your Spellskite in the GY), but I was never a fan of Relic in the first place - to get Pyroclasm and Relic to interact with each other took a bit of luck and a lot of work.
Ugin's the best thing I could think of to maximize the time that Spellskite buys us (and it's fun to run 8 Oblivion Stones) and has a bit of synergy in saving your walkers from Maelstrom Pulse/Oblivion Ring/etc, but that point I'm a lot less certain on. I just had exactly 4 MD slots remaining, and Ugin was staring at me (as I said, I've disliked Relic). You could try Prophetic Prisms or Explores I guess - though 2 mana cyclers in general feel really clunky to me. I'd rather just have things to play that impact the gamestate (that was the point of Spellskite).
I dropped to 3 pyroclasm because I felt that drawing more than one (like ever) was resulting in game losses as they just stuck in my hand and did nothing.
I kept them in the deck mostly because in a fairly unknown metagame (as it still is) it's worth hitting unknown fast strategies which would otherwise run us over. Bogles and affinity both are a concern.
However I can see the merits of dropping them in favour of 3x spellskite and running a full set of them in order to provide a similar "roadblock" function for easier mana, and also as a bonus completely switch off certain strategies. The logic is there and i'm on board basically.
As foR ugin..... WeLl I'm running 2 and while I can see going to three, (and probably will), i don't think 4 is an option. It means cuttinG ulamog, maybe a single o-stone, and cutting down on cantrips as well. I don't want to upset the balance of cantrip-to-bomb.
Good discussion though. I feel like we learnt more in the last page than we have in weeks.
4 Ugin could be excessive, but I found in a lot of matchups he'd end the game as much as a Karn, so it seemed like a fun idea. Pyroclasms are quite good vs Bogles, but the fun part is that Spellskite is just better (assuming they don't have the Path, thus the upping of basics). Vs. Affinity you definitely want Pyroclasm - but as I said, that's vs Affinity only, and then it's becoming an Affinity-specific hate card instead of a full-meta answer. Spellskites aren't slouches either, preventing them from Modularizing their Ravagers and blocking various ground-pounders (even jumping in the way of a single Plating swing).
I also like the discussion, and have learned that my card evaluation skills may need a bit of work. Ugin certainly is quite a bit better than I gave him credit for, even if he may or may not be a 4-of in my deck in the long run.
That's true; my meta's kind of inbred, so it could be just me. I'd still like to find better tools against Folk.
Maybe Engineered Explosives? We usually have some trouble getting enough colored mana to make it useful, but if they're giving you one island every game it makes the task much easier.
After Pod got banned i am now back on my previous deck, tron. Hello:D
Think it gonna be well positioned in the new meta.
Dropped pyroclasm aswell and wanted to try some single removal spells because there is ugin as a newer boardsweepr. Couple pages ago i found a list with path to Exile wich got me, so i tinkered with it and give this list tomorrow at 4 rounds FNM a try. Hopefuly path gonna be great as it is in my head^^ Killing all big dudes, early guys like confis, manlands of infect- control- affinty and also disrupting twin. And if i gona blow up evrything some turns later i dont need to path of course.
Mainboard i realy like 2 copies of spellskite vs infect, affinty, twin and ye even vs random removal thats supposed to hit wurmcoil out of junk. vs burn they suck some dmg aswell even if i dont have time/life to redirect spells that often.
Manabase... hard to replace burnhillow because evrything trys to make us damage. I gonna try 3 thickets for the early drops, and one tutorable g/W source wich doesnt comes into play tapped later. Could be a big mistake so i cant hit the "8th" mana fter t1-2tron but if t1-2 tron is available, we are are ahead anyway.^^
My board contains some Feed the Clan to interact with lokal burn players, aswell as couple of Sundering Titans to hopfuly win mainly vs scapeshift (uwr and junk :D)cause the lack of slaughtergames (wich i never was impressed with aswell)
I would like to squeeze ~2 relics maindeck just to get some grave hate against snapcasters, but already got 60 Cards.
Alright so ugin is the real deal. Is he the real deal over clasm or stone is the big question. I would venture a guess and say clasm is what gets the cut as oblivion stone is instant speed removal which is still useful.
Ok, so I ran my list in a 14 player local Modern event, easily went 4-0 with it. Never felt that Ugin should have been a O-stone.. I was ALWAYS happy to see him.
Mono U tron: 2-0 | First game I had natural tron and went Karn into Karn, deck has a tendenancy to do this, second game was grindy but I managed to Slaugher Games his Mindslaver and worked my way through a Sundering Titan & pair of Wurmcoils into Emrakul, game.
Junk: 2-0 | Ugin is so gross in this matchup, they need to address Karn immediately and then your followup play is a even bigger & badder Walker, figures.
Burn: 2-1 | I lost the first match, and I close the second 2 on the back of Ugin wiping the board and just buying me time to resolve Coils for the win... Ugin is perfect vs Burn imo, just feels insane.
Martyr proc: 2-0 | this is a straight auto-win, I don't see how we can lose this mu especially now with the Ugins just X = 1 completely obliterating the board
Ugin is the real deal guys, you should run atleast 3 to feel the shear power. I didn't miss the O-stones in a single match (I'm running 1 mb, 1 sb at the moment).
I have a Modern pPTQ this weekend and I'm currently making my decklist, this is the exact same list as written up last page, I'm more than confident with it.
Let's take a look at this
Monu U Tron Ugin had no effect here and seems like it really wouldn't be amazing (granted O-stone's probably aren't amazing this match up)
Junk This is already a really good match up, slamming an ugin versus any other threat is really just win more
Burn Yeah, sure ugin is great if you can slam him turn 4, wouldnt pyroclasm/sweeper just have done the same thing? Or even an O-stone. Burn really only runs like 12 permanents
Martyr As you said, auto win, ugin is just a win more.
I agree Ugin is good, but all of your examples an Ostone/sweeper effect would have done the same thing and possible came on-line earlier then ugin and not dependant on a t3/t4 tron. I wouldnt say those examples can conclude anything.
We were more irritated at the way you posted your comment with blatant disregard of the actual discussion. If you come here with detailed reasoning and explain the pros/cons of a card in an honest manner I don't think anybody would have a problem with any suggestion you made.
That is a really greedy list indeed Slivortal. I don't forsee a list that top-heavy playing through hate as effectively as something more stock. I don't believe in sacred cows but cutting Pyroclasm completely is not something I can get behind yet. Nothing serves us better as a cheap sweeper than Pyroclasm, even if it is blank against many decks. Against some bad machups it is a win-card. Playing a pair of Ugin MD as a swap for Clasm like the GP list is reasonable, but going full-tilt-boogie with the full playset is getting risky.
Interesting deck none-the-less, keep us posted on changes. I've got my eye on Ugin but I'm not ready to jump ship and throw a playset in my deck yet.
I've tested Slivortal's list and here's some things I've learned.
G1: Spellskite and/or Ugin > Pyroclasm Game 1. Their guys either are too big or there are no guys to attack at sorcery speed (I'm starting to get annoyed by an Esper Control deck that wins solely off Man-lands I've seen cropping up).
Combust is a thing right now. Play plenty out of the sideboard.
Speaking of which, I ran into a guy yesterday MAINING Fulminator Mages in his BG deck. That... sucked.
On a related note, G(r) Tron has picked up on Cockatrice between Ugin's release and the meta game shake up of Pod's ban. It's kind of annoying because game one is a race to Karn away lands and G2/3 is the same except occasionally Slaughter Games pulls Karn out of the game.
Conclusion: UrzaTron has a strong position in the meta right now, but the problem is other people know that too... which boils down to UrzaTron is doing its usually thing; we just have Ugin this time around.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Vive, vale. Siquid novisti rectius istis,
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
Ok, so I ran my list in a 14 player local Modern event, easily went 4-0 with it. Never felt that Ugin should have been a O-stone.. I was ALWAYS happy to see him.
Mono U tron: 2-0 | First game I had natural tron and went Karn into Karn, deck has a tendenancy to do this, second game was grindy but I managed to Slaugher Games his Mindslaver and worked my way through a Sundering Titan & pair of Wurmcoils into Emrakul, game.
Junk: 2-0 | Ugin is so gross in this matchup, they need to address Karn immediately and then your followup play is a even bigger & badder Walker, figures.
Burn: 2-1 | I lost the first match, and I close the second 2 on the back of Ugin wiping the board and just buying me time to resolve Coils for the win... Ugin is perfect vs Burn imo, just feels insane.
Martyr proc: 2-0 | this is a straight auto-win, I don't see how we can lose this mu especially now with the Ugins just X = 1 completely obliterating the board
Ugin is the real deal guys, you should run atleast 3 to feel the shear power. I didn't miss the O-stones in a single match (I'm running 1 mb, 1 sb at the moment).
I have a Modern pPTQ this weekend and I'm currently making my decklist, this is the exact same list as written up last page, I'm more than confident with it.
Let's take a look at this
Monu U Tron Ugin had no effect here and seems like it really wouldn't be amazing (granted O-stone's probably aren't amazing this match up)
Junk This is already a really good match up, slamming an ugin versus any other threat is really just win more
Burn Yeah, sure ugin is great if you can slam him turn 4, wouldnt pyroclasm/sweeper just have done the same thing? Or even an O-stone. Burn really only runs like 12 permanents
Martyr As you said, auto win, ugin is just a win more.
I agree Ugin is good, but all of your examples an Ostone/sweeper effect would have done the same thing and possible came on-line earlier then ugin and not dependant on a t3/t4 tron. I wouldnt say those examples can conclude anything.
I can't see myself going past the 1 I'm running.
The issue is that in all those MUs, he's much better than Pyroclasm. Ugin can effectively answer Serra Ascendant in a way that Pyroclasm can't, it can provide a 3-turn clock vs Blue Tron, Junk isn't as great of a matchup as he once was (and it's much better than Clasm there), and Clasm only hits Guides and Eidolons from Burn (and that's if they don't have the Mutagenic Growth; it'll never kill Swiftspears regardless). It also effectively saves you 2 life over Clasm from Eidolon.
We were more irritated at the way you posted your comment with blatant disregard of the actual discussion. If you come here with detailed reasoning and explain the pros/cons of a card in an honest manner I don't think anybody would have a problem with any suggestion you made.
That is a really greedy list indeed Slivortal. I don't forsee a list that top-heavy playing through hate as effectively as something more stock. I don't believe in sacred cows but cutting Pyroclasm completely is not something I can get behind yet. Nothing serves us better as a cheap sweeper than Pyroclasm, even if it is blank against many decks. Against some bad machups it is a win-card. Playing a pair of Ugin MD as a swap for Clasm like the GP list is reasonable, but going full-tilt-boogie with the full playset is getting risky.
Interesting deck none-the-less, keep us posted on changes. I've got my eye on Ugin but I'm not ready to jump ship and throw a playset in my deck yet.
I had a bunch of store credit built up at an LGS, so I didn't really need to do much investing, fortunately. I started with 2, then added a 3rd, and a 4th. Every time I saw a Pyroclasm I would ask, "would I prefer an Ugin?" And the answer to that question was a resounding yes.
I've tested Slivortal's list and here's some things I've learned.
G1: Spellskite and/or Ugin > Pyroclasm Game 1. Their guys either are too big or there are no guys to attack at sorcery speed (I'm starting to get annoyed by an Esper Control deck that wins solely off Man-lands I've seen cropping up).
Combust is a thing right now. Play plenty out of the sideboard.
Speaking of which, I ran into a guy yesterday MAINING Fulminator Mages in his BG deck. That... sucked.
On a related note, G(r) Tron has picked up on Cockatrice between Ugin's release and the meta game shake up of Pod's ban. It's kind of annoying because game one is a race to Karn away lands and G2/3 is the same except occasionally Slaughter Games pulls Karn out of the game.
Conclusion: UrzaTron has a strong position in the meta right now, but the problem is other people know that too... which boils down to UrzaTron is doing its usually thing; we just have Ugin this time around.
It could be right to be MDing 2 Ghost Quarters over 1 right now. That way we have more answers to manlands and have a better Tron mirror. The weakest spot in the list is probably the 1 Ulamog, 1 of 3 Wurmcoils, or 1 of 4 Groves. The issue is that I really like Ulamog vs those control decks (as it kills manlands through counterspells), and it's obviously great in the mirror as well. That leaves the Wurmcoils or the Groves; at that point it's deciding whether one prefers to run 20 or 21 lands, I think (and going down to 2 Wurmcoils could be just wrong, but they seem to matter less by the day). I really like the 2 Forests (even if it drops the Grove count to 3), because it ensures the "lose-lose" situation of the opponent Pathing a T2 Spellskite (opening up green mana on T3 and potentially a T3 Ugin to boot). They can't not Path it or we have all the time in the world, but if they Path it they open the possibility of accelerating us a turn.
The issue is that in all those MUs, he's much better than Pyroclasm. Ugin can effectively answer Serra Ascendant in a way that Pyroclasm can't, it can provide a 3-turn clock vs Blue Tron, Junk isn't as great of a matchup as he once was (and it's much better than Clasm there), and Clasm only hits Guides and Eidolons from Burn (and that's if they don't have the Mutagenic Growth; it'll never kill Swiftspears regardless). It also effectively saves you 2 life over Clasm from Eidolon
You can't look at it as a pyroclasm versus ugin vacuum. One is an 8 drop you aren't slamming unless you have assembled tron (or it's a late turn which you will have to have lived too). Look at what you were using as examples as to ugins worth. I've been testing near exclusivley against the aggro decks of the new meta - affinity, zoo, burn - I can tell you in that vacuum pyroclasm is strictly better. As much as you think ugin is a strictly better then pyroclasm, yeah in magic christmas land where you t3 tron every game and drop him, sure, much better then pyro. But the games you are struggling to put it together and need a sweep, you are going to be missing pyroclasm. Which is why I'm trying to find a similar replacement as pyroclasm, while doing work in those, leaves a little to be desired.
The issue is that in all those MUs, he's much better than Pyroclasm. Ugin can effectively answer Serra Ascendant in a way that Pyroclasm can't, it can provide a 3-turn clock vs Blue Tron, Junk isn't as great of a matchup as he once was (and it's much better than Clasm there), and Clasm only hits Guides and Eidolons from Burn (and that's if they don't have the Mutagenic Growth; it'll never kill Swiftspears regardless). It also effectively saves you 2 life over Clasm from Eidolon
You can't look at it as a pyroclasm versus ugin vacuum. One is an 8 drop you aren't slamming unless you have assembled tron (or it's a late turn which you will have to have lived too). Look at what you were using as examples as to ugins worth. I've been testing near exclusivley against the aggro decks of the new meta - affinity, zoo, burn - I can tell you in that vacuum pyroclasm is strictly better. As much as you think ugin is a strictly better then pyroclasm, yeah in magic christmas land where you t3 tron every game and drop him, sure, much better then pyro. But the games you are struggling to put it together and need a sweep, you are going to be missing pyroclasm. Which is why I'm trying to find a similar replacement as pyroclasm, while doing work in those, leaves a little to be desired.
My testing has led me in the opposite direction. Pyroclasm has been nothing but miserable, and Spellskite has reigned supreme. Big Zoo is all the rage nowadays, and no one's running the types of small creatures that get hit by clasm. True, your opponent is trying to disrupt your Tron. But in game 1, it should be relatively easy to hit Tron with relative consistency, and in game 1, Ugin is better than Pyroclasm in every matchup except for Affinity (even considering the mana difference). From that point, you run Pyroclasms in your SB, so you have access to them for game 2.
I've seen various reports claiming that Pyroclasm wasn't great before the Pod/TC ban, and after the Pod/TC ban, the 2 biggest MUs that were hurt by the card are now gone. I'd honestly rather run MD Combusts than Pyroclasm, because Combust hits Twin, blue/white-based control, Junk, Merfolk, and even Zoo (Smiter, Anafenza, Rhino) far better than Pyroclasm does. But Combust is useless against Burn, Scapeshift, Affinity, Bogles, etc. - that's why I run Ugin.
Building Magic decks is something you have to do with the metagame in mind. Right now, regardless of your thoughts on Ugin, Combust and Spellskite are both better cards than Pyroclasm and Relic of Progenitus. But while Combust and Pyroclasm are both dead in certain MUs (Spellskite funnily is dead in almost no MU), Ugin hedges against the entire field better than Pyroclasm or Combust individually. That's why I'm running 3 Pyroclasm/Combust in the SB, but 4 Ugin in the MD. Because Ugin's guaranteed to be a live card (to some extent) G1, and we want live cards in our deck.
When Birthing Pod, Delver, and smaller Zoo ran rampant and we could guarantee that Pyroclasm was always going to be relevant, it was a great card. Without those decks in the meta, the format (Affinity excluded) shifted to completely 3+ toughness (if they run creatures at all). While Ugin may not be the best card in the 75, I like him a lot better in those 4 MD slots than Pyroclasm, Combust, or Relic - all of which I can bring in for game 2.
The issue is that in all those MUs, he's much better than Pyroclasm. Ugin can effectively answer Serra Ascendant in a way that Pyroclasm can't, it can provide a 3-turn clock vs Blue Tron, Junk isn't as great of a matchup as he once was (and it's much better than Clasm there), and Clasm only hits Guides and Eidolons from Burn (and that's if they don't have the Mutagenic Growth; it'll never kill Swiftspears regardless). It also effectively saves you 2 life over Clasm from Eidolon
You can't look at it as a pyroclasm versus ugin vacuum. One is an 8 drop you aren't slamming unless you have assembled tron (or it's a late turn which you will have to have lived too). Look at what you were using as examples as to ugins worth. I've been testing near exclusivley against the aggro decks of the new meta - affinity, zoo, burn - I can tell you in that vacuum pyroclasm is strictly better. As much as you think ugin is a strictly better then pyroclasm, yeah in magic christmas land where you t3 tron every game and drop him, sure, much better then pyro. But the games you are struggling to put it together and need a sweep, you are going to be missing pyroclasm. Which is why I'm trying to find a similar replacement as pyroclasm, while doing work in those, leaves a little to be desired.
My testing has led me in the opposite direction. Pyroclasm has been nothing but miserable, and Spellskite has reigned supreme. Big Zoo is all the rage nowadays, and no one's running the types of small creatures that get hit by clasm. True, your opponent is trying to disrupt your Tron. But in game 1, it should be relatively easy to hit Tron with relative consistency, and in game 1, Ugin is better than Pyroclasm in every matchup except for Affinity (even considering the mana difference). From that point, you run Pyroclasms in your SB, so you have access to them for game 2.
I've seen various reports claiming that Pyroclasm wasn't great before the Pod/TC ban, and after the Pod/TC ban, the 2 biggest MUs that were hurt by the card are now gone. I'd honestly rather run MD Combusts than Pyroclasm, because Combust hits Twin, blue/white-based control, Junk, Merfolk, and even Zoo (Smiter, Anafenza, Rhino) far better than Pyroclasm does. But Combust is useless against Burn, Scapeshift, Affinity, etc. - that's why I run Ugin.
Building Magic decks is something you have to do with the metagame in mind. Right now, regardless of your thoughts on Ugin, Combust and Spellskite are both better cards than Pyroclasm and Relic of Progenitus. But while Combust and Pyroclasm are both dead in certain MUs (Spellskite funnily is dead in almost no MU), Ugin hedges against the entire field better than Pyroclasm or Combust individually. That's why I'm running 3 Pyroclasm/Combust in the SB, but 4 Ugin in the MD. Because Ugin's guaranteed to be a live card (to some extent) G1, and we want live cards in our deck.
How can you make such statements like they are "strictly better"? There is no metagame yet. We've had 0 large scale tournaments, no pro tour with the banning, and really no clue where it will settle. If you want to make your deck to tailor to your local game store, be my guest but I'm here looking for feedback on a broad, GP/Pro tour level basis because that's what I'm testing for. Until I've played hundreds of games against every single deck that may become a chunk of the metagame, there is no way I could say "regardless of your thoughts on X, Y is strictly better". Have you tested that extensively against every deck in the format? I can't believe in just over 2 weeks you have. All of these options (pyro, ugin, spellskite, ect ect) to me are still very live in such a fresh format now. Sure, I'd rather have Ugin against junk. But if they run bob? No, now i'd want pyro back. If I play affinity? Now I want pyro back (or a valid replacement.) UWR Control? Now I want ugin.
What I'm getting at is until we have clear cut look at the format or you can tell me you've jammed 100 games against the entire expected metagame, theres no way you can slam dunk eliminate a card from a testing gauntlet.
The issue is that in all those MUs, he's much better than Pyroclasm. Ugin can effectively answer Serra Ascendant in a way that Pyroclasm can't, it can provide a 3-turn clock vs Blue Tron, Junk isn't as great of a matchup as he once was (and it's much better than Clasm there), and Clasm only hits Guides and Eidolons from Burn (and that's if they don't have the Mutagenic Growth; it'll never kill Swiftspears regardless). It also effectively saves you 2 life over Clasm from Eidolon
You can't look at it as a pyroclasm versus ugin vacuum. One is an 8 drop you aren't slamming unless you have assembled tron (or it's a late turn which you will have to have lived too). Look at what you were using as examples as to ugins worth. I've been testing near exclusivley against the aggro decks of the new meta - affinity, zoo, burn - I can tell you in that vacuum pyroclasm is strictly better. As much as you think ugin is a strictly better then pyroclasm, yeah in magic christmas land where you t3 tron every game and drop him, sure, much better then pyro. But the games you are struggling to put it together and need a sweep, you are going to be missing pyroclasm. Which is why I'm trying to find a similar replacement as pyroclasm, while doing work in those, leaves a little to be desired.
My testing has led me in the opposite direction. Pyroclasm has been nothing but miserable, and Spellskite has reigned supreme. Big Zoo is all the rage nowadays, and no one's running the types of small creatures that get hit by clasm. True, your opponent is trying to disrupt your Tron. But in game 1, it should be relatively easy to hit Tron with relative consistency, and in game 1, Ugin is better than Pyroclasm in every matchup except for Affinity (even considering the mana difference). From that point, you run Pyroclasms in your SB, so you have access to them for game 2.
I've seen various reports claiming that Pyroclasm wasn't great before the Pod/TC ban, and after the Pod/TC ban, the 2 biggest MUs that were hurt by the card are now gone. I'd honestly rather run MD Combusts than Pyroclasm, because Combust hits Twin, blue/white-based control, Junk, Merfolk, and even Zoo (Smiter, Anafenza, Rhino) far better than Pyroclasm does. But Combust is useless against Burn, Scapeshift, Affinity, etc. - that's why I run Ugin.
Building Magic decks is something you have to do with the metagame in mind. Right now, regardless of your thoughts on Ugin, Combust and Spellskite are both better cards than Pyroclasm and Relic of Progenitus. But while Combust and Pyroclasm are both dead in certain MUs (Spellskite funnily is dead in almost no MU), Ugin hedges against the entire field better than Pyroclasm or Combust individually. That's why I'm running 3 Pyroclasm/Combust in the SB, but 4 Ugin in the MD. Because Ugin's guaranteed to be a live card (to some extent) G1, and we want live cards in our deck.
How can you make such statements like they are "strictly better"? There is no metagame yet. We've had 0 large scale tournaments, no pro tour with the banning, and really no clue where it will settle. If you want to make your deck to tailor to your local game store, be my guest but I'm here looking for feedback on a broad, GP/Pro tour level basis because that's what I'm testing for. Until I've played hundreds of games against every single deck that may become a chunk of the metagame, there is no way I could say "regardless of your thoughts on X, Y is strictly better". Have you tested that extensively against every deck in the format? I can't believe in just over 2 weeks you have. All of these options (pyro, ugin, spellskite, ect ect) to me are still very live in such a fresh format now. Sure, I'd rather have Ugin against junk. But if they run bob? No, now i'd want pyro back. If I play affinity? Now I want pyro back (or a valid replacement.) UWR Control? Now I want ugin.
What I'm getting at is until we have clear cut look at the format or you can tell me you've jammed 100 games against the entire expected metagame, theres no way you can slam dunk eliminate a card from a testing gauntlet.
I never said "strictly better," I just said "better in the current meta," as in based off a combination of what decks we've seen from SCG and what decks are being developed for the new metagame. In testing, even when Junk runs Bob, I prefer Ugin. What are they drawing off of Bob that makes Ugin not good? I mean, hand disruption could be slightly poor for us, but it's really not that bad if we have Tron assembled. What if we play Ugin, wipe their field, and they rip Maelstrom Pulse off the top? I still would have preferred to have Ugin. Now, drawing into Fulminator Mage could be bad for us, but those are SB cards, and we have a chance to modify the deck before those games.
I will admit that if this meta devolves into one where every Junk deck is running 4x MD Fulminator Mage AND Dark Confidants, Pyroclasm could be better than the individual card Ugin in that matchup. But now we're talking about such a small subset of Junk games; you have to be facing a deck that 1. Runs MD Fulminator Mages, 2. Runs Dark Confidant, 3. Draws Confidant, and 4. Draws into Fulminator Mage in the 1 or maybe 2 turns after they play Dark Confidant. This represents a far more restrictive subset of games than the ones where you 1-for-1 Pyroclasm their Confidant (wasting a whole turn), and then they just go over the top with Anafenzas and Siege Rhinos while you're struggling to assemble Tron (especially given that you held back on Maps, Scryings, and Stirrings that are now vulnerable to Thoughtseize/Inquisition).
All-in-all, Ugin is a far more powerful card in the Junk MU with or without Confidant. Rather than arguing as to what the metagame isn't, could you argue for what decks we could possibly see (other than a field of 30%+ Affinity) that could make Pyroclasm worth playing? I'm honestly all ears; the card wasn't great before Birthing Pod was banned, and it's certainly not now that it is.
And to be perfectly honest, I don't think that Ugin is necessarily "the next coming of Karn." I think it's quite a bit worse than Karn given his mana cost, and quite a bit worse than O-Stone given his inflexibility. But he's a lot better than a different random 4 cards we could be running, and I feel serves to make this deck a little more consistent in the 60 (with tools to modify in G2 and G3).
Silvortal has basically explained what I was trying to say before in much broader, so I thank them for that.
Yes, I went 2-3 in this particular 1k. I lost to storm, UWR(named sowing salts with slaughter games to find out they weren't there) and burn. Last month I took the whole thing down with g/r tron. I play at a store that has dudes like max brown and Dan Jordan at there playing too, so I feel like I have an ok grasp on tron within a competitive level.
I think ugin is a great turn four, and this nonsense about not setting up tron effeciently. I have tron on turn 4 a good amount of time, maybe I just have better luck, I don't know. Ugin wipes the board(not effecting you at all because colorless) and protects himself. O stone is great too. Don't get me wrong. But o stone doesn't stay around after to bolt your opponent in the face to win game on his ult or just slamming Emrakul. Now with that said, you still need to worry about affinity and infect and twin so you have SB cards like natures claim, combust o stone or even vandalblast. I really think ugin is the bee knees and well worth at least 3 slots mainboard.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Grand Arbiter
Omnath
Skittles
I know, I can't believe I'm saying it myself. But I've just been so unimpressed with Pyroclasm in this metagame. Unless you feel like you're specifically going to be facing against Affinity on a given day, it just feels so insufficient. The only creature not run by Affinity that Pyroclasm hits is Dark Confidant, or an unboosted merfolk lord (unlikely in that matchup). Nobody runs mana dorks, nobody runs creatures in Zoo with less than 3 toughness. It hits Snapcaster Mages, but if I'm playing Pyroclasm to sweep the board of Snapcaster Mage, it's not exactly where I want to be.
In all of the above matchups (except perhaps Affinity), Spellskite is better, especially when you can back it up with 1 of 8 planeswalkers in 1-2 turns.
Ugin's a lot worse than Karn, and a lot worse than Oblivion Stone. But he's simultaneously a lot better than Pyroclasm in 75-80% of our matchups.
I used to see opening hands with Pyroclasm and go "Great, I can't wait to blow my opponent out on turn 2!" Nowadays when I see Pyroclasm, my immediate response is "I can't wait to board this out in Game 2 - let's see what the rest of this hand looks like." And if it's gotten to that point, I'd much rather see Spellskite, which I find myself sideboarding in in 70% of our matchups instead of sideboarding out. If our goal is still for our MD to give us the maximum power against the maximum amount of the metagame, we don't want to be playing to the Affinities - we want to be playing to all of our MUs. And even if Affinity's one of our worse MUs, so is Twin (where Spellskite is a lot better than Pyroclasm, and even Ugin is slightly better), Burn (where Pyroclasm is dead against even Monastery Swiftspear), Bogles (where Spellskite is again a lot better than Pyroclasm), Scapeshift (where Pyroclasm is useless), and the mirror (where Pyroclasm is also useless).
I even like it more against BGx. Sure, Dark Confidant is a great source of card advantage. But it's not going to be swinging through a Spellskite, and their spells don't matter if we buy the time we need to get to our endgame.
Maybe Sundering Titan would be better in Ugin's spot (though I've honestly liked Ugin a lot better)? Maybe cycling Relics is a lot better than I give them credit for? Either way, I've been so unimpressed by Pyroclasm that I'm officially moving it to the SB - where I can bring it in for the matchups it shines in, instead of just having dead cards in my MD.
Nobody runs mana dorks anymore, and I'd honestly much rather have Ugin than Pyroclasm against decks running Bob (even if it is slower). I love having MD Pyroclasms if I'm expecting to play Affinity, but I also love having MD Combusts if I'm expecting Twin, or MD Slaughter Games if I'm expecting Scapeshift.
Decks Pyroclasm is good against honestly occupy such a narrow slice of the meta that I don't actively want to see it in most of my games - which is why I want to run something else in its place. I like Spellskite for a start, but I'd also like another board sweeper for all these decks going bigger than 2 toughness. Ugin doesn't cost that much more mana than Firespout (as funny as that sounds), and hits a lot more cards like Rhinos and Anafenzas, as well as noncreature nonland permanents.
I still think the card's not that great in metas where Pyroclasm is good, but I do think it's really good in some metas where Pyroclasm is bad.
I've run Mindslaver-Tron in metas where Pyroclasm's been bad in the past, but Ugin's better than Mindslaver in fulfilling the role that Pyroclasm can't.
Maybe this is all insane ravings that I'll regret in a couple of days or weeks, but Ugin seems really good now that all the decks that Pyroclasm was good against are banned. Affinity's going to have to be extremely popular to justify what are in essence 3 MD hate cards. It would be like a BGx deck MDing Stony Silence to hit the Tron MU; it just sounds ridiculous.
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
Grand Arbiter
Omnath
Skittles
I totally agree with Pyroclasm feeling extremely underwhelming this week. Against zoo it's (almost) dead - most of there guys are 2/3. Near useless versus infect (I say near as it does clear there t1 guy on your t2), only decent against affinity and only very early. Honestly, the biggest problem from affinity is the man lands. Having said all of that, I don't think Ugin is the answer. It does what we want but can be too late against the hyper aggressive decks if we dont curve out well with the tron pieces. I feel like we still need a low casting cost sweeper/removal of some sort. I'm going to have to pore through the gatherer and see if anything jumps out at me.
I kept them in the deck mostly because in a fairly unknown metagame (as it still is) it's worth hitting unknown fast strategies which would otherwise run us over. Bogles and affinity both are a concern.
However I can see the merits of dropping them in favour of 3x spellskite and running a full set of them in order to provide a similar "roadblock" function for easier mana, and also as a bonus completely switch off certain strategies. The logic is there and i'm on board basically.
As foR ugin..... WeLl I'm running 2 and while I can see going to three, (and probably will), i don't think 4 is an option. It means cuttinG ulamog, maybe a single o-stone, and cutting down on cantrips as well. I don't want to upset the balance of cantrip-to-bomb.
Good discussion though. I feel like we learnt more in the last page than we have in weeks.
I think the bigger takeaway is that Spellskite feels a ton better than Pyroclasm right now. It's as good/better in all the MUs that Pyroclasm is good in (except maybe Affinity), and it's absolutely stellar in some MUs that Pyroclasm was/is useless in (Zoo, etc). I feel it's pretty strong. Now, I don't know if 1 Emrakul 1 Ugin 3 Wurmcoil 4 Ugin 4 Karn 4 O-Stone is really where we want to be in terms of the rest of the deck, but I think that you could 1-for-1 convert Pyroclasms to Spellskites in most lists and see an improvement in the new meta. I think that Relic could potentially be worse now that you can't kill their Goyfs as they shrink to 0/1 (and they grow rather fast from there, especially if they somehow get your Spellskite in the GY), but I was never a fan of Relic in the first place - to get Pyroclasm and Relic to interact with each other took a bit of luck and a lot of work.
Ugin's the best thing I could think of to maximize the time that Spellskite buys us (and it's fun to run 8 Oblivion Stones) and has a bit of synergy in saving your walkers from Maelstrom Pulse/Oblivion Ring/etc, but that point I'm a lot less certain on. I just had exactly 4 MD slots remaining, and Ugin was staring at me (as I said, I've disliked Relic). You could try Prophetic Prisms or Explores I guess - though 2 mana cyclers in general feel really clunky to me. I'd rather just have things to play that impact the gamestate (that was the point of Spellskite). 4 Ugin could be excessive, but I found in a lot of matchups he'd end the game as much as a Karn, so it seemed like a fun idea. Pyroclasms are quite good vs Bogles, but the fun part is that Spellskite is just better (assuming they don't have the Path, thus the upping of basics). Vs. Affinity you definitely want Pyroclasm - but as I said, that's vs Affinity only, and then it's becoming an Affinity-specific hate card instead of a full-meta answer. Spellskites aren't slouches either, preventing them from Modularizing their Ravagers and blocking various ground-pounders (even jumping in the way of a single Plating swing).
I also like the discussion, and have learned that my card evaluation skills may need a bit of work. Ugin certainly is quite a bit better than I gave him credit for, even if he may or may not be a 4-of in my deck in the long run.
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
Maybe Engineered Explosives? We usually have some trouble getting enough colored mana to make it useful, but if they're giving you one island every game it makes the task much easier.
Think it gonna be well positioned in the new meta.
Dropped pyroclasm aswell and wanted to try some single removal spells because there is ugin as a newer boardsweepr. Couple pages ago i found a list with path to Exile wich got me, so i tinkered with it and give this list tomorrow at 4 rounds FNM a try. Hopefuly path gonna be great as it is in my head^^ Killing all big dudes, early guys like confis, manlands of infect- control- affinty and also disrupting twin. And if i gona blow up evrything some turns later i dont need to path of course.
Mainboard i realy like 2 copies of spellskite vs infect, affinty, twin and ye even vs random removal thats supposed to hit wurmcoil out of junk. vs burn they suck some dmg aswell even if i dont have time/life to redirect spells that often.
Manabase... hard to replace burnhillow because evrything trys to make us damage. I gonna try 3 thickets for the early drops, and one tutorable g/W source wich doesnt comes into play tapped later. Could be a big mistake so i cant hit the "8th" mana fter t1-2tron but if t1-2 tron is available, we are are ahead anyway.^^
My board contains some Feed the Clan to interact with lokal burn players, aswell as couple of Sundering Titans to hopfuly win mainly vs scapeshift (uwr and junk :D)cause the lack of slaughtergames (wich i never was impressed with aswell)
I would like to squeeze ~2 relics maindeck just to get some grave hate against snapcasters, but already got 60 Cards.
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
3 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Spellskite
4 Karn Liberated
2 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
4 Ancient Stirrings
4 Sylvan Scying
4 Chromatic Star
4 Chromatic Sphere
4 Expedition Map
4 Path to Exile
1 Eye of Ugin
1 Forest
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Brushland
3 Razorverge Thicket
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Tower
3 Relic of Progenitus
4 Nature's Claim
2 Sundering Titan
3 Defense Grid
3 Feed the Clan
www.magickeller.de
Facebook:
www.facebook.com/magickeller
Youtube:
Magickeller Hannover YOUTUBE Channel
Let's take a look at this
Monu U Tron Ugin had no effect here and seems like it really wouldn't be amazing (granted O-stone's probably aren't amazing this match up)
Junk This is already a really good match up, slamming an ugin versus any other threat is really just win more
Burn Yeah, sure ugin is great if you can slam him turn 4, wouldnt pyroclasm/sweeper just have done the same thing? Or even an O-stone. Burn really only runs like 12 permanents
Martyr As you said, auto win, ugin is just a win more.
I agree Ugin is good, but all of your examples an Ostone/sweeper effect would have done the same thing and possible came on-line earlier then ugin and not dependant on a t3/t4 tron. I wouldnt say those examples can conclude anything.
I can't see myself going past the 1 I'm running.
We were more irritated at the way you posted your comment with blatant disregard of the actual discussion. If you come here with detailed reasoning and explain the pros/cons of a card in an honest manner I don't think anybody would have a problem with any suggestion you made.
That is a really greedy list indeed Slivortal. I don't forsee a list that top-heavy playing through hate as effectively as something more stock. I don't believe in sacred cows but cutting Pyroclasm completely is not something I can get behind yet. Nothing serves us better as a cheap sweeper than Pyroclasm, even if it is blank against many decks. Against some bad machups it is a win-card. Playing a pair of Ugin MD as a swap for Clasm like the GP list is reasonable, but going full-tilt-boogie with the full playset is getting risky.
Interesting deck none-the-less, keep us posted on changes. I've got my eye on Ugin but I'm not ready to jump ship and throw a playset in my deck yet.
Going 2-3 isn't going to convince anyone and other people who tested Ugin already stated that he's the real deal, you aren't saying anything new.
G1: Spellskite and/or Ugin > Pyroclasm Game 1. Their guys either are too big or there are no guys to attack at sorcery speed (I'm starting to get annoyed by an Esper Control deck that wins solely off Man-lands I've seen cropping up).
Combust is a thing right now. Play plenty out of the sideboard.
Speaking of which, I ran into a guy yesterday MAINING Fulminator Mages in his BG deck. That... sucked.
On a related note, G(r) Tron has picked up on Cockatrice between Ugin's release and the meta game shake up of Pod's ban. It's kind of annoying because game one is a race to Karn away lands and G2/3 is the same except occasionally Slaughter Games pulls Karn out of the game.
Conclusion: UrzaTron has a strong position in the meta right now, but the problem is other people know that too... which boils down to UrzaTron is doing its usually thing; we just have Ugin this time around.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
You can't look at it as a pyroclasm versus ugin vacuum. One is an 8 drop you aren't slamming unless you have assembled tron (or it's a late turn which you will have to have lived too). Look at what you were using as examples as to ugins worth. I've been testing near exclusivley against the aggro decks of the new meta - affinity, zoo, burn - I can tell you in that vacuum pyroclasm is strictly better. As much as you think ugin is a strictly better then pyroclasm, yeah in magic christmas land where you t3 tron every game and drop him, sure, much better then pyro. But the games you are struggling to put it together and need a sweep, you are going to be missing pyroclasm. Which is why I'm trying to find a similar replacement as pyroclasm, while doing work in those, leaves a little to be desired.
I've seen various reports claiming that Pyroclasm wasn't great before the Pod/TC ban, and after the Pod/TC ban, the 2 biggest MUs that were hurt by the card are now gone. I'd honestly rather run MD Combusts than Pyroclasm, because Combust hits Twin, blue/white-based control, Junk, Merfolk, and even Zoo (Smiter, Anafenza, Rhino) far better than Pyroclasm does. But Combust is useless against Burn, Scapeshift, Affinity, Bogles, etc. - that's why I run Ugin.
Building Magic decks is something you have to do with the metagame in mind. Right now, regardless of your thoughts on Ugin, Combust and Spellskite are both better cards than Pyroclasm and Relic of Progenitus. But while Combust and Pyroclasm are both dead in certain MUs (Spellskite funnily is dead in almost no MU), Ugin hedges against the entire field better than Pyroclasm or Combust individually. That's why I'm running 3 Pyroclasm/Combust in the SB, but 4 Ugin in the MD. Because Ugin's guaranteed to be a live card (to some extent) G1, and we want live cards in our deck.
When Birthing Pod, Delver, and smaller Zoo ran rampant and we could guarantee that Pyroclasm was always going to be relevant, it was a great card. Without those decks in the meta, the format (Affinity excluded) shifted to completely 3+ toughness (if they run creatures at all). While Ugin may not be the best card in the 75, I like him a lot better in those 4 MD slots than Pyroclasm, Combust, or Relic - all of which I can bring in for game 2.
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
How can you make such statements like they are "strictly better"? There is no metagame yet. We've had 0 large scale tournaments, no pro tour with the banning, and really no clue where it will settle. If you want to make your deck to tailor to your local game store, be my guest but I'm here looking for feedback on a broad, GP/Pro tour level basis because that's what I'm testing for. Until I've played hundreds of games against every single deck that may become a chunk of the metagame, there is no way I could say "regardless of your thoughts on X, Y is strictly better". Have you tested that extensively against every deck in the format? I can't believe in just over 2 weeks you have. All of these options (pyro, ugin, spellskite, ect ect) to me are still very live in such a fresh format now. Sure, I'd rather have Ugin against junk. But if they run bob? No, now i'd want pyro back. If I play affinity? Now I want pyro back (or a valid replacement.) UWR Control? Now I want ugin.
What I'm getting at is until we have clear cut look at the format or you can tell me you've jammed 100 games against the entire expected metagame, theres no way you can slam dunk eliminate a card from a testing gauntlet.
I will admit that if this meta devolves into one where every Junk deck is running 4x MD Fulminator Mage AND Dark Confidants, Pyroclasm could be better than the individual card Ugin in that matchup. But now we're talking about such a small subset of Junk games; you have to be facing a deck that 1. Runs MD Fulminator Mages, 2. Runs Dark Confidant, 3. Draws Confidant, and 4. Draws into Fulminator Mage in the 1 or maybe 2 turns after they play Dark Confidant. This represents a far more restrictive subset of games than the ones where you 1-for-1 Pyroclasm their Confidant (wasting a whole turn), and then they just go over the top with Anafenzas and Siege Rhinos while you're struggling to assemble Tron (especially given that you held back on Maps, Scryings, and Stirrings that are now vulnerable to Thoughtseize/Inquisition).
All-in-all, Ugin is a far more powerful card in the Junk MU with or without Confidant. Rather than arguing as to what the metagame isn't, could you argue for what decks we could possibly see (other than a field of 30%+ Affinity) that could make Pyroclasm worth playing? I'm honestly all ears; the card wasn't great before Birthing Pod was banned, and it's certainly not now that it is.
And to be perfectly honest, I don't think that Ugin is necessarily "the next coming of Karn." I think it's quite a bit worse than Karn given his mana cost, and quite a bit worse than O-Stone given his inflexibility. But he's a lot better than a different random 4 cards we could be running, and I feel serves to make this deck a little more consistent in the 60 (with tools to modify in G2 and G3).
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
Yes, I went 2-3 in this particular 1k. I lost to storm, UWR(named sowing salts with slaughter games to find out they weren't there) and burn. Last month I took the whole thing down with g/r tron. I play at a store that has dudes like max brown and Dan Jordan at there playing too, so I feel like I have an ok grasp on tron within a competitive level.
I think ugin is a great turn four, and this nonsense about not setting up tron effeciently. I have tron on turn 4 a good amount of time, maybe I just have better luck, I don't know. Ugin wipes the board(not effecting you at all because colorless) and protects himself. O stone is great too. Don't get me wrong. But o stone doesn't stay around after to bolt your opponent in the face to win game on his ult or just slamming Emrakul. Now with that said, you still need to worry about affinity and infect and twin so you have SB cards like natures claim, combust o stone or even vandalblast. I really think ugin is the bee knees and well worth at least 3 slots mainboard.