I'm making the spellskite switch today. Makes building the sideboard trickier as i still want 3x Defense grid and some amount of boil. But hey it's cool
This post reminds me of a meta observation: Scapeshfit, and combo in general, are on the decline. In fact, other than UR STorm, Twin, and Amulet, I haven't played any since the bans took effect. It may be an online thing only, but this leads me to believe that Slaughter Games should be replaced by Boil. BUT, SG is still superior in the mirror. Anyway, I'm goint to switch to 3x Boil for the immediate future. I already play 2 Defense Grid; maybe 3 in combination with Boil would be a good insurance policy incase of Scapeshift.
Speaking of UR Storm, the most common configuration of it I've seen is to SB in to Twin. Now, this doesn't effect us tremendously as we would generally be siding in many of the same cards (like nature's claim), but this might fool you into siding out your Spellskites and making sub-optimal choices. I mention this only because it has caught me off guard before and while I don't think it is a particularly strong strategy, the mind games they can play G3 are real and can cost you games (and matches). Prepare for this.
Several different flavors of Zoo floating around: Naya Little Zoo/Big Zoo, WRGu with Giest + cheap permission, WRGb with Rhino + discard, and 5c with Rhino, Geist, and Tribal Flames. Some matchups Pyroclasm works just fine (Little Zoo and U Zoo) others you need Firespout and sometimes that isn't enough. Ostone/Ugin can be a turn too slow even with perfect draws. The differing SB answers, including whether or not they play Blood Moon may require different answers. Keep these decks in mind.
The consensus on Spellskite is that it is a very useful card and deserves 2-4 slots in the 75. The question is how many, where, and in place of what? A pair in the MD have been treating me right and I like access to additional copies in the board when it is an allstar. I'm currently playing them in the slots that I would dedicate to Relic of Prog, not Pyroclasm. Infect is slowly gaining traction again and Boggles is still present, increasing Skites value even further. Plus he's useful in the mirror.
Yet another blurb about Ugin: the last few days and at my LGS I've been playing a pair of Ugin MD in place of 2 Pyroclasm. That gives me a MD sweeper setup of 4 Ostone, 2 Ugin, 2 Pyro, with an additional Pyro + 2 Firespout in the board as an insurance policy against aggro. This setup has been great to me and I really like the 2/2 split. Reason being that as strong as Ugin is, he is still a turn 4 play at the earliest and very susceptible to the decks slow draws, where he is effectively a blank while you struggle to get Tron online. For this reason, he is something I never want to see two of. I do not foresee myself going above 2 any time soon. Even if Clasm effects were irrelvant tomorrow, I would still play 2 Ugin and turn the clasms into Relics or more Spellskites or something.
I'll post a list in a few days after I can do some brief testing with the SG/Boil comparison but the general list is: 4Ostone, 2 Ugin, 2 Pyro. Creatures 2 Spellskite, 3 Wurmcoil, 1 Emrakul. 2 Prophetic Prism (or relic). standard land lineup with Wastes for utility slot. SB including 2 Skite, 2 Defense Grid, 1 Pyro + 2 Firespout, and Slaughter games.
Some testing for the future will include seeing if the pair of cantrips would be better off as a 3rd MD Spellskite and 3 MD pyroclasm, Slaughter games turning into Boil, turning the Llanowar wastes into a second Forest (obv), and 3 Defense Grid. Maybe some combusts as filler but I've already stated why I don't like it. Burn is still a major threat but I don't know if addressing it with specific hate is going to be effective enough to be worth it.
Great discussion the last week. Thread has been really productive.
Is Little Zoo really still out there? From what I've seen, the deck just operates as a worse Burn or Big Zoo (depending on which way you're trying to go). It definitely existed pre-KTK, but I thought that Siege Rhino just about killed the deck.
Even against Little Zoo, what are we hitting with Clasm? Not Kird Ape or Loam Lion, and rarely Swiftspear - all we seem to hit are Kitties on the play, just like Big Zoo.
I haven't faced up against Blue Zoo in a while, but even against Tribal Zoo I prefer Ugin to Pyroclasm - just hitting Geist isn't nearly enough when our opponent isn't even guaranteed to draw the card (and Geist doesn't actually make its first attack until T4 anyways).
As for the 2-of Pyroclasm, I like it even less than 3/4-of Pyroclasm (even though I'm definitely not the card's biggest fan). Adding Pyroclasm to your deck means that you want to see it, but as a 2-of just means you're not guaranteed to see it in the MUs where you want it, and it's still possible for you to see it in the MUs where you don't.
It's also why I don't like Pyroclasm G1; you can't evaluate Pyroclasm in your opening hands as a good card, even if it turns out to be good in that MU. Then you end up with weird N-1 hands + Pyroclasm, and you don't know whether Pyroclasm's going to buy you time or just dead vs the T4 Splinter Twin. At least in Spellskite you can be reasonably assured that it's going to be some kind of speed bump, whether against Affinity, Twin, Zoo, etc. Since so much of this deck's game comes down to evaluating mulligan decisions, having such a wild card makes your life really miserable (unless you already know what everyone's already playing).
Back to X-ofs, though - this is the line of thought that I follow when deciding how many of a card I want in my deck (especially concerning the MD).
1-of: Tutor targets. In our deck, lands like Eye of Ugin, and creatures like Emrakul and Ulamog.
2-of: Generally not optimal. Reserved for cards that you want as 5th and 6th copies of another card (such as Ugin is to O-Stone), or a 2/2 split (such as running 2 Pyroclasm and 2 All Is Dust). I also think that running Ancient Stirrings makes our 2-ofs more like 3-ofs (an Ancient Stirrings will hit a 2-of ~20% of the time). However, as this advantage doesn't extend to Pyroclasms, I really don't feel like running 2 Pyroclasms is really where you want to be (unless you consider Ugin another Pyroclasm, which I think is tenable - at least All Is Dust CAN land T3). The general issue of 2-ofs is that you're not guaranteed to see them, but when you do see them you can't control when.
3-of: Cards you want to see, but not more than once (Pyroclasm fits here). Note this is still no guarantee you won't see more than 1, so you can still get blown out by drawing multiple Clasms in an MU like Zoo. This is perfect for Wurmcoil, as Wurmcoil really shines in certain MUs more than others (and we ideally don't want to draw multiple all the time).
4-of: Cards you want to see always, and in multiples. Karn, Map, Stirrings, Scrying, Sphere, Star, O-Stone, and Tron pieces.
Maybe I'm wrong, and 2/2 splitting Pyroclasms with Ugins is great - I'll honestly have to test it to be sure. But I think that Ugin's a poor All Is Dust if your goal is to do a Pyroclasm impression.
I know a lot of you have been removing Pyroclasm from the MB, and I want to do this too, but I don't really know what to replace it with, or how to adjust the SB accordingly. I really like Firespout in the SB because my local meta has a lot of merfolk and zoo. I also kinda want to fit another Defense Grid in the SB.
Any advice/criticisms for a Tron noob?
Looks pretty good, very similar to what I'd be running if I were to sleeve up a 75 other than my greedy list. I might consider cutting the Wastes for a Forest - a lot of players will snap-Path a T2 Spellskite, and the ability to fetch it off of Ghost Quarter (yours and your opponent's)/Paths/topdeck it vs Blood Moon and not pay life tapping it for G vastly outweigh its ability to produce black mana for Slaughter Games in my opinion. In my months and months of running the card, I can remember perhaps a single instance of tutoring it for Slaughter Games (we already run 8 eggs), and even then I think I topdecked the egg anyway. I'm really not a fan of the card, especially when you're only running 2 of them in the SB, and running 2 GQs MD.
I copied the quote below from the weekly SCG Modern thread about the 160-person Modern Premier IQ in Indianapolis this weekend. Very diverse and aggro-oriented top 16; it's worth checking out the results. I think this person's comment is relevant to the ongoing pyroclasm discussion.
Hey guys, I just got home from Indy. I was the guy in 11th with the Bant Conscription deck. In the last round some of the x-1's didn't want to ID, so one 6-2 made Top 8, but unfortunately my pretty good breakers were not quite good enough.
The field at large had a seemingly ENORMOUS amount of Affinity in it. I played against Affinity 4 times out of 8 rounds (3 in the early rounds including against one of the guys who Top 8'd with it, and once in the late rounds). A few other players I talked to remarked about the relative lack of Junk decks, I believe only two Junk decks were spotted near the top tables. Looking around at the top tables, I didn't see any Scapeshift players at all and only saw one Tron deck -- the lack of pyroclasms obviously was nice for me and for the guy who was tearing it up with Elves but came up just short.
The most interesting rogue deck I saw was in Round 8, a guy was playing a Soul Sisters deck with Return to the Ranks and had Viscera Seers and Blood Artists. He told me that Sam Black had written about it and he and his buddy had adjusted it from that list, iirc.
BTW, I was amazed at how many people had to read Sovereigns of Lost Alara. Like I think all day maybe only one guy didn't pick it up and stare at it. I had to fetch the English copy of Conscription all day instead of my foreign one just to avoid a million calls for oracle text. Both these cards were played in what was arguably the best deck in Standard only 4 years ago, so I have to surmise there are a lot of people playing Modern who didn't play in ALA/ZEN standard, which says something about the game's growth during that span.
I'm waiting on a few things to come in (some being a set of russian 9th tron I pieced together over the weekend) but once I get all the cards in I'll try it at an event and evaluate what having no pyroclasm main does for me
I copied the quote below from the weekly SCG Modern thread about the 160-person Modern Premier IQ in Indianapolis this weekend. Very diverse and aggro-oriented top 16; it's worth checking out the results. I think this person's comment is relevant to the ongoing pyroclasm discussion.
Hey guys, I just got home from Indy. I was the guy in 11th with the Bant Conscription deck. In the last round some of the x-1's didn't want to ID, so one 6-2 made Top 8, but unfortunately my pretty good breakers were not quite good enough.
The field at large had a seemingly ENORMOUS amount of Affinity in it. I played against Affinity 4 times out of 8 rounds (3 in the early rounds including against one of the guys who Top 8'd with it, and once in the late rounds). A few other players I talked to remarked about the relative lack of Junk decks, I believe only two Junk decks were spotted near the top tables. Looking around at the top tables, I didn't see any Scapeshift players at all and only saw one Tron deck -- the lack of pyroclasms obviously was nice for me and for the guy who was tearing it up with Elves but came up just short.
The most interesting rogue deck I saw was in Round 8, a guy was playing a Soul Sisters deck with Return to the Ranks and had Viscera Seers and Blood Artists. He told me that Sam Black had written about it and he and his buddy had adjusted it from that list, iirc.
BTW, I was amazed at how many people had to read Sovereigns of Lost Alara. Like I think all day maybe only one guy didn't pick it up and stare at it. I had to fetch the English copy of Conscription all day instead of my foreign one just to avoid a million calls for oracle text. Both these cards were played in what was arguably the best deck in Standard only 4 years ago, so I have to surmise there are a lot of people playing Modern who didn't play in ALA/ZEN standard, which says something about the game's growth during that span.
I just wish there was a better alternative to pyroclasm. I've been testing firespout and it's good sometimes but miserable the others (but not that pyro would be much better.) When it's bad it's really bad (pyroclasm) but it can just bail you out sometimes against the hyper-aggro decks.
I've been testing dropping the pyro's and 2 relics and adding 4 explore and 2 more lands (extra forest and an extra ghost quarter). This can allow you to both play and pop an Oblivion Stone turn 3 (in magical christmas land, mind you) as well as firespouts as direct replacements. I find all my affinity matches come down to me seeing enough hate for inkmoth nexus, which is why I added a second ghost quarter.
I played Gr Tron at the Modern PIQ and made 34th (lost my last round that might have put me near the T16). I felt like a ton of people were playing Tron. There were about 3-4 rounds where I sat down and had a Tron match going on either side as me. At my 7th round match against Scapeshift, there was a Tron mirror to my left and a dude playing Tron against something on my right. My matches were against UR Storm (2-0), UWr Geist (0-2), some dredge deck (2-0), Mono Green Aggro (2-0), Merfolk (1-2), Affinity (2-1), Scapeshift (2-0), Bloom Titan (0-2).
I saw a fair amount of people playing Junk, but maybe just not as much as people were expecting. I had never played Gr Tron before (only Blue Tron), but I had a lot of fun and the only match that felt pretty abysmal was the Bloom Titan match. I'm sure if I had more experience I could have tightened up some of my plays and turned some of those losses into wins. Definitely gonna stick with the deck.
My round 8 opponent seemed to think Tron wasn't very good, a "trap" as he called it because it was just too slow to handle the format. I mentioned that when you're goal is to be dropping Primeval Titans on turn 2 and swinging for 8 or more damage, then I imagine everything seems slow by comparison
If the meta follows this week's SCG top 16, then my stance on Pyroclasm may have been preemptive; there are definitely quite a few good decks that it hits in this recent list.
I played Gr Tron at the Modern PIQ and made 34th (lost my last round that might have put me near the T16). I felt like a ton of people were playing Tron. There were about 3-4 rounds where I sat down and had a Tron match going on either side as me. At my 7th round match against Scapeshift, there was a Tron mirror to my left and a dude playing Tron against something on my right. My matches were against UR Storm (2-0), UWr Geist (0-2), some dredge deck (2-0), Mono Green Aggro (2-0), Merfolk (1-2), Affinity (2-1), Scapeshift (2-0), Bloom Titan (0-2).
I saw a fair amount of people playing Junk, but maybe just not as much as people were expecting. I had never played Gr Tron before (only Blue Tron), but I had a lot of fun and the only match that felt pretty abysmal was the Bloom Titan match. I'm if I had more experience I could have tightened up some of my plays and turned some of those losses into wins. Definitely gonna stick with the deck.
My round 8 opponent seemed to think Tron wasn't very good, a "trap" as he called it because it was just too slow to handle the format. I mentioned that when you're goal is to be dropping Primeval Titans on turn 2 and swinging for 8 or more damage, then I imagine everything seems slow by comparison
Glad to have a convert; the deck's a blast. What list did you play? And yeah, the Bloom Titan MU is pretty rough.
Slivortal, just want to make sure you understand that Spellskite/Pyroclasm are not in the same category of cards in my book. I compare Pyro to Ugin/All is dust/Firespout and Skite to Relics/Cantrips. So talking about Spellskite vs Pyroclasm is not the direction I want to be going, as the cards are very different and shine in different scenarios, while both do nothing about advancing your game-state. Yes they both cost 2 mana but they don't have the same function. I compare Pyro to Ugin because they are both good against creature decks, while Pyro is a million times better when you need it and Ugin is better when Pyro is out of range or the board is neutral. I want a total of 8 sweepers MD. My split is 2 Ugin/2 Pyro and 2 Skite/2 relic.
I don't understand the lack of Ostones, as Affinity isn't the only reason to not cut it for Ugins. The instant speed pop is extremely useful, not just against Twin but any deck playing sorcery-speed threats. The threat of an immediate boardwipe looming over the other guys head changes their play. Sometimes "3 + 5: Destroy an enchantment/creature" is good enough to win the game. I imagine you guys don't face much hate either, because Ugin gets stranded in my hand against Junk enough as it is and I only play 2. Having the opportunity to slow-cast stone forces your opponent to either back off on playing threats or push hard to race. Ostone is reach, allowing you to interact with the opponent in a way no other MB card can.
The argument should be Pyro vs Ugin vs All is Dust IMO. All 3 are sorcery-speed mass removal with their own pros and cons. Ugin effectively winning the game all by himself is enough to justify him over AiD, especially when7 vs 8 in the first 3-4 turns means you have a turn 3-4 Tron (hint: you're already in a good position).It comes down to Pyroclasm being easily castable when you don't have Tron, early enough in the game to buy you several turns worth of life and time, and when you're opponent is actively trying to stop you from assembling Tron. I like the Ugin/Pyro split here because when Pyro is blank, Ugin may in fact still be relevant. Post-board, they are both easy swap outs for more relevant cards. I also like the remaining Pyros/Firespouts in the board to give you 10+ sweeps vs fast aggro.
Firespout is better against Zoo than Pyroclasm but it should be noted that Firespout is often not entirely effective against Affinity unless you're able to assemble 1GR.
If the meta follows this week's SCG top 16, then my stance on Pyroclasm may have been preemptive; there are definitely quite a few good decks that it hits in this recent list.
Yeah, if Affinity is catching back on (where has it been on Cockatrice? I've been playing Modern straight since Ugin was added. One thing I will say is that Ugin conceptually still has some value in the Affinity match up: he hits Vault Skirge and Master Ethirium and his plus can kill Etched Champion. However, Ugin is a card that would best be used as a follow-up to gaining control of the game and his biggest drawback is he can't hit (Bl)inkmoth Nexus... although I always liked Staff of Nin for that. It may be time to split him between the main and side.
I saw a fair amount of people playing Junk, but maybe just not as much as people were expecting. I had never played Gr Tron before (only Blue Tron), but I had a lot of fun and the only match that felt pretty abysmal was the Bloom Titan match. I'm if I had more experience I could have tightened up some of my plays and turned some of those losses into wins. Definitely gonna stick with the deck.
My round 8 opponent seemed to think Tron wasn't very good, a "trap" as he called it because it was just too slow to handle the format. I mentioned that when you're goal is to be dropping Primeval Titans on turn 2 and swinging for 8 or more damage, then I imagine everything seems slow by comparison
If you want to show Kangaroo (I was there when the deck first started catching on and tried to push for that name... still do) the hypocrisy of preaching about speed, hit their Amulet of Vigor. The reason I ultimately stopped playing Kangaroo though is because the deck runs... less efficient... when you can't assemble a specific set of cards and sequence them in the right order. *Sound familiar?* Unlike Tron, there's no limping by without your correct cards.
My list was a pretty typical pre-Ugin version. Mostly because I didn't know if I'd be able to find Ugin before the event, and because I had no experience with the deck, so I didn't feel comfortable making changes.
Thinking about the losses I had, I could have played tighter and I can see the paths that led to losing the game. The game against UWr, I Pyro'd his first Geist, but next turn he played another, and I didn't really find anything to deal with it. In the second game I was stumbling on lands, so I tried an Ancient Stirrings...for about 5 turns. It was Remand > Snap Remand > Counterflux > Snap Counterflux. All the time I was getting no action. Gonna try getting in some more play time before I start tweaking the deck. Pyroclasm was decent in most of my matches (UWr, Merfolk, Affinity, Dredge). Relic was just ok, but pretty relevant in that matches it mattered (Storm, Dredge).
Hey guys, so I just bought R/G tron as my first modern deck. Figured the birthing pod ban was as good of a signal as any to jump in and so I pulled the trigger.
Is there a good list of sideboard plans vs various decks?
I just finished a Modern tournament tonight but albeit at a small store and came out 1st place with this list. I was not able to scrape together all the cards I needed for something more optimal but it did not make a huge impact on my game.
Changes would look like this
-4 Razorverge Thicket +4 Temple Garden
-2 Torpor Orb +1 Nature's Claim +1 Boil
-3 Relic of Progenitus +3 Leyline of Sanctity
Timely Reinforcements is completely main deckable and it saw play every game. With the hopeful inclusion of Shocklands next tournament it will almost always guarantee both effects as well.
Matchups
Round 1
vs 8 Rack
Game 1
Pretty much an autowin here, play out Karn, he can't do anything even with redirecting damage with Rack to Karn. But the guy also kept a one land hand so I am not sure what was up with that.
Game 2
board in +3 Nature's Claim +3 Surgical Extraction
He plays a turn 2 Pack Rats and I drop a natural Karn turn 3 exiling a land pass turn he drops a land plays Pithing Needle naming Karn and drops an Ensnaring Bridge his following turn. I end up dropping two Wurmcoil's immediately after the bridge stalling out the game until I resolved an Ugin and won.
1-0
Round 2
vs Burn splashing black
Game 1
He draws into enough direct damage spells and Skullcrack's my life gain and wins from Boros Charm and Bolt.
Game 2
Board in +3 Spellskites, +3 Nature's Claim, and +2 Surgical Extraction
Did not see any of these but drew into double Wurmcoil and double Timely Reinforcements and trounced him.
Game 3
Stalled the game out with Wurmcoil's and lots of lifegain and he couldn't get there.
2-0
Round 3
vs American Control
Essentially a long drawn out autoloss for the control player. I cannot remember the exact game but Remands and Mana Leaks do no not do a lot against me and I resolved a Timely Reinforcements twice in one game.
Changes would look like this
-4 Razorverge Thicket +4 Temple Garden
-2 Torpor Orb +1 Nature's Claim +1 Boil
-3 Relic of Progenitus +3 Leyline of Sanctity
Timely Reinforcements is completely main deckable and it saw play every game. With the hopeful inclusion of Shocklands it will almost always guarantee both effects as well.
Hrm... Timely Reinforcements maindeck isn't a bad idea. Though I think I'd rather play Brushland than Temple Garden.
Changes would look like this
-4 Razorverge Thicket +4 Temple Garden
-2 Torpor Orb +1 Nature's Claim +1 Boil
-3 Relic of Progenitus +3 Leyline of Sanctity
Timely Reinforcements is completely main deckable and it saw play every game. With the hopeful inclusion of Shocklands it will almost always guarantee both effects as well.
Hrm... Timely Reinforcements main deck isn't a bad idea. Though I think I'd rather play Brushland than Temple Garden.
I am not sure which would be better yet. I am going to just play them both on Cockatrice and at my LGS in the meantime and see how it goes.
i've been playing tron for a few months now. i've mostly stuck to the stock list with 4 wurmcoils/pyro/o-stone and 3 relics. been doing pretty well most of the time in the local environment with some exceptions due to fumbled plays (new to the format).
in my testing of ugin i've found that when i'm able to land him that i've already had the game pretty well locked up. no doubt he is more powerful than an o-stone in many circumstances but i find that when i'm being disrupted that he just stares at me from my hand and taunts me. i never tested him too much instead of pyro because they are just too good in my meta; faeries, affinity, burn, rock, and a R/G ramp deck. rather useless against scapeshift and twin but i can't afford to leave them out of my MB as it is.
i would like to fit ugin somewhere in the sideboard but space is at a premium. i traded out 2 spellskites from the SB to replace a wurmcoil and a relic. i wish i could fit another ghost quarter in as well.
Played at the Indy SCG Modern 5K this weekend. Ended up 31/157ish, just into the payout. 5-3 overall; hadn't lost a single game until the 5th round too. 2-0 IzzeTron, 2-0 Jund, 2-0 8-Rack, 2-0 UWR Khans creatures midrange, 0-2 Burn, 1-2 Merfolk, 1-2 Bloom Titan, 2-0 Grixis Twin. The meta was...well, I'll give a full report once I get my homework done.
Played at the Indy SCG Modern 5K this weekend. Ended up 31/157ish, just into the payout. 5-3 overall; hadn't lost a single game until the 5th round too. 2-0 IzzeTron, 2-0 Jund, 2-0 8-Rack, 2-0 UWR Khans creatures midrange, 0-2 Burn, 1-2 Merfolk, 1-2 Bloom Titan, 2-0 Grixis Twin. The meta was...well, I'll give a full report once I get my homework done.
Congrats on the top 32 - looking forward to your list/report.
Is there a good list of sideboard plans vs various decks?
Sideboards are something that should never remain the same due to constant meta shifts, but considering we all play the same 54-56 cards and the same 7+ SB cards, siding is generally pretty straightforward once you play the deck for a while.
Some things to remember include:
1) Eye of Ugin is actually a 7-spell that also costs a land drop. Against any deck where the game is decided in the early-mid game (burn, Affinity, Boggles, Infect, etc.), you should SB out Eye and Emrakul.
2) For similar reasons, it is typical to SB out a pair of Sylvan Scrying if you need more space. This also applies if you are siding in several colored spells.
3) If the opponent is likely to SB in Stony Silence or Blood Moon, you should put in at least 2-3 Nature's Claim, even the full set if you have more weak cards in the MD. Both cards are backbreaking enough that having insurance against them is worth the possibility that they are bad life-gain spells.The
4) The first cards to look at to SB out are Ostones, Pyroclasms, and Relics. Ostone and Clasm are obv dead in several matchups, and Relic is the weakest of the consistency cards.
General cards that people often play and what they come in against. By no means comprehensive or what you should always do, just a guideline.
Affinity: -Eye -Emrakul -2 SylScry, -Relics +Natures Claim +Sweepers +Specific Hate (vandalblast/Grudge) +Spellskite
Junk: -Pyros -Spellskites +Natures Claims +4th Wurmcoil +any leftover Relics
Scapeshift: -Pyros -Ostones -Ugins -up to two Wurmcoils if you need +Boils +Slaughter GAmes +Defense Grid +SPellskite +any relics if you have cards leftover
Burn: -Ostones -Eye + Emrakul -2 SylScry +Claim +Spellskite +4th Wurmcoil +any other lifegain or cheap removal.
The Mirror: -Pyros -2 Wurmcoil +Claims +Spellskites +Slaughter GAmes
Twin: This is very dependant on what you have in the board, as often most of our SB can come in against Twin but it isn't neccesarily correct to weaken our own gameplan too much as they can still kill you with beats. -Pyros -Relics (if UR)- 2 SylScry -Eye + Emrakul -2 Wurmcoil if needed (but don't do this if you SB out Eye and Emrakul) +Natures Claim +Defense Grid +Spellskite +Combust +Torpor Orb (really poor card currently) + Boil. I personally find Slaughter Games to be a reasonable option but many think its a poor choice. A case could be made against KArn as karn is dependant on early Tron and doesn't stop the Combo.
Lots of things I didn't mention. If you want specific choices to take out against specific decks post a list and SB.
EDIT: Timely Reinforcements is a pretty strong card, but I doubt it is better than the entire suite of cards red has to offer. The fact that Grove of the Burnwillows is far and away the best dual land a deck like Tron could play is quite relevant, especially compared to things like shocklands, scars fastlands, and painlands.
I don't know if Path to Exile and Leyline of Sanctity are strong enough to justify white over red. White is certainly a million times better than red against Burn, but red is much stronger against fast aggro (pyroclasm) and combo (boil, Slaughter Games).
I've actually started toying around with white isntead of red as well, but for wall of omens, soaks damage pretty well but the built in draw has been wonderful.
I've actually started toying around with white isntead of red as well, but for wall of omens, soaks damage pretty well but the built in draw has been wonderful.
Trying new things like color splashes is one thing, but Wall of Omens is inferior to Spellskite when we take into account the colored-mana cost. Nobody loves drawing cards more than me but the fact that you either need a sphere or a white land to cast it makes it unplayable. Pyroclasm is a colored 2-drop but it typically wins the game when it is relevant, instead of cantriping + maybe gaining some life on our important second turn. The other colored 2-drop (Scrying) is a consitency card that allows the deck to function and a green spell instead of splash color. Spellskite fills a similar role as a blocker but also has a super-niche ability that is incredible in several of our awful matchups. When they print Wall of omens for 2 lets talk but the only reasons to splash white currently are Timely Reinforcements and Path to Exile, Leyline of Sanctity is questionable but possible. I can't think of any other value white brings opposed to red.
In order to play white effectively as a splash color over red you don't get to run Grove. There is a huge difference between Grove, which is really a Taiga, vs any other dual in modern. Other duals either cost life or tempo, both of which will lose you games. It is the same reason that everytime someone asks "can i use karpulsan instead of grove" they get a resounding "no".
Timely as a SB card in Gr Tron with a typical manabase, from personal experience (yes anecdotal evidence), is unfortunately not consistently castable to be worth the slots. It is game-changing against red decks, which are bad matchups, but unlike Slaughter Games, the matchups we want our hard-to-cast spell we don't have as much time to cast it AND SG cannot be interacted with. Against most other decks it not impactful enough to counteract the consistency issues. If we want more specific ammo for red decks, Feed the Clan is a good candidate.
@masterplum: another matchup where Ostone is an insta-out is Scapeshift. Reasonable to SB out a couple in the mirror.
Is Little Zoo really still out there? From what I've seen, the deck just operates as a worse Burn or Big Zoo (depending on which way you're trying to go). It definitely existed pre-KTK, but I thought that Siege Rhino just about killed the deck.
Even against Little Zoo, what are we hitting with Clasm? Not Kird Ape or Loam Lion, and rarely Swiftspear - all we seem to hit are Kitties on the play, just like Big Zoo.
I haven't faced up against Blue Zoo in a while, but even against Tribal Zoo I prefer Ugin to Pyroclasm - just hitting Geist isn't nearly enough when our opponent isn't even guaranteed to draw the card (and Geist doesn't actually make its first attack until T4 anyways).
As for the 2-of Pyroclasm, I like it even less than 3/4-of Pyroclasm (even though I'm definitely not the card's biggest fan). Adding Pyroclasm to your deck means that you want to see it, but as a 2-of just means you're not guaranteed to see it in the MUs where you want it, and it's still possible for you to see it in the MUs where you don't.
It's also why I don't like Pyroclasm G1; you can't evaluate Pyroclasm in your opening hands as a good card, even if it turns out to be good in that MU. Then you end up with weird N-1 hands + Pyroclasm, and you don't know whether Pyroclasm's going to buy you time or just dead vs the T4 Splinter Twin. At least in Spellskite you can be reasonably assured that it's going to be some kind of speed bump, whether against Affinity, Twin, Zoo, etc. Since so much of this deck's game comes down to evaluating mulligan decisions, having such a wild card makes your life really miserable (unless you already know what everyone's already playing).
Back to X-ofs, though - this is the line of thought that I follow when deciding how many of a card I want in my deck (especially concerning the MD).
1-of: Tutor targets. In our deck, lands like Eye of Ugin, and creatures like Emrakul and Ulamog.
2-of: Generally not optimal. Reserved for cards that you want as 5th and 6th copies of another card (such as Ugin is to O-Stone), or a 2/2 split (such as running 2 Pyroclasm and 2 All Is Dust). I also think that running Ancient Stirrings makes our 2-ofs more like 3-ofs (an Ancient Stirrings will hit a 2-of ~20% of the time). However, as this advantage doesn't extend to Pyroclasms, I really don't feel like running 2 Pyroclasms is really where you want to be (unless you consider Ugin another Pyroclasm, which I think is tenable - at least All Is Dust CAN land T3). The general issue of 2-ofs is that you're not guaranteed to see them, but when you do see them you can't control when.
3-of: Cards you want to see, but not more than once (Pyroclasm fits here). Note this is still no guarantee you won't see more than 1, so you can still get blown out by drawing multiple Clasms in an MU like Zoo. This is perfect for Wurmcoil, as Wurmcoil really shines in certain MUs more than others (and we ideally don't want to draw multiple all the time).
4-of: Cards you want to see always, and in multiples. Karn, Map, Stirrings, Scrying, Sphere, Star, O-Stone, and Tron pieces.
Maybe I'm wrong, and 2/2 splitting Pyroclasms with Ugins is great - I'll honestly have to test it to be sure. But I think that Ugin's a poor All Is Dust if your goal is to do a Pyroclasm impression.Looks pretty good, very similar to what I'd be running if I were to sleeve up a 75 other than my greedy list. I might consider cutting the Wastes for a Forest - a lot of players will snap-Path a T2 Spellskite, and the ability to fetch it off of Ghost Quarter (yours and your opponent's)/Paths/topdeck it vs Blood Moon and not pay life tapping it for G vastly outweigh its ability to produce black mana for Slaughter Games in my opinion. In my months and months of running the card, I can remember perhaps a single instance of tutoring it for Slaughter Games (we already run 8 eggs), and even then I think I topdecked the egg anyway. I'm really not a fan of the card, especially when you're only running 2 of them in the SB, and running 2 GQs MD.
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
I just wish there was a better alternative to pyroclasm. I've been testing firespout and it's good sometimes but miserable the others (but not that pyro would be much better.) When it's bad it's really bad (pyroclasm) but it can just bail you out sometimes against the hyper-aggro decks.
I've been testing dropping the pyro's and 2 relics and adding 4 explore and 2 more lands (extra forest and an extra ghost quarter). This can allow you to both play and pop an Oblivion Stone turn 3 (in magical christmas land, mind you) as well as firespouts as direct replacements. I find all my affinity matches come down to me seeing enough hate for inkmoth nexus, which is why I added a second ghost quarter.
I saw a fair amount of people playing Junk, but maybe just not as much as people were expecting. I had never played Gr Tron before (only Blue Tron), but I had a lot of fun and the only match that felt pretty abysmal was the Bloom Titan match. I'm sure if I had more experience I could have tightened up some of my plays and turned some of those losses into wins. Definitely gonna stick with the deck.
My round 8 opponent seemed to think Tron wasn't very good, a "trap" as he called it because it was just too slow to handle the format. I mentioned that when you're goal is to be dropping Primeval Titans on turn 2 and swinging for 8 or more damage, then I imagine everything seems slow by comparison
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
I don't understand the lack of Ostones, as Affinity isn't the only reason to not cut it for Ugins. The instant speed pop is extremely useful, not just against Twin but any deck playing sorcery-speed threats. The threat of an immediate boardwipe looming over the other guys head changes their play. Sometimes "3 + 5: Destroy an enchantment/creature" is good enough to win the game. I imagine you guys don't face much hate either, because Ugin gets stranded in my hand against Junk enough as it is and I only play 2. Having the opportunity to slow-cast stone forces your opponent to either back off on playing threats or push hard to race. Ostone is reach, allowing you to interact with the opponent in a way no other MB card can.
The argument should be Pyro vs Ugin vs All is Dust IMO. All 3 are sorcery-speed mass removal with their own pros and cons. Ugin effectively winning the game all by himself is enough to justify him over AiD, especially when7 vs 8 in the first 3-4 turns means you have a turn 3-4 Tron (hint: you're already in a good position).It comes down to Pyroclasm being easily castable when you don't have Tron, early enough in the game to buy you several turns worth of life and time, and when you're opponent is actively trying to stop you from assembling Tron. I like the Ugin/Pyro split here because when Pyro is blank, Ugin may in fact still be relevant. Post-board, they are both easy swap outs for more relevant cards. I also like the remaining Pyros/Firespouts in the board to give you 10+ sweeps vs fast aggro.
Firespout is better against Zoo than Pyroclasm but it should be noted that Firespout is often not entirely effective against Affinity unless you're able to assemble 1GR.
If you want to show Kangaroo (I was there when the deck first started catching on and tried to push for that name... still do) the hypocrisy of preaching about speed, hit their Amulet of Vigor. The reason I ultimately stopped playing Kangaroo though is because the deck runs... less efficient... when you can't assemble a specific set of cards and sequence them in the right order. *Sound familiar?* Unlike Tron, there's no limping by without your correct cards.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
4 Chromatic Sphere
4 Expedition Map
4 Relic of Progenitus
4 Pyroclasm
4 Sylvan Scrying
4 Ancient Stirrings
4 Karn Liberated
4 Oblivion Stone
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
4 Urza's Tower
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Mine
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Forest
1 Eye of Ugin
1 Llanowar Wastes
3 Nature's Claim
3 Slaughter Games
3 Combust
2 Spellskite
2 Torpor Orb
2 Ancient Grudge
Thinking about the losses I had, I could have played tighter and I can see the paths that led to losing the game. The game against UWr, I Pyro'd his first Geist, but next turn he played another, and I didn't really find anything to deal with it. In the second game I was stumbling on lands, so I tried an Ancient Stirrings...for about 5 turns. It was Remand > Snap Remand > Counterflux > Snap Counterflux. All the time I was getting no action. Gonna try getting in some more play time before I start tweaking the deck. Pyroclasm was decent in most of my matches (UWr, Merfolk, Affinity, Dredge). Relic was just ok, but pretty relevant in that matches it mattered (Storm, Dredge).
Is there a good list of sideboard plans vs various decks?
4 Urza's Tower
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Mine
4 Razorverge Thicket
2 Forest
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Eye of Ugin
Creatures
4 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
4 Karn Liberated
2 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
4 Expedition Map
4 Sylvan Scrying
4 Oblivion Stone
4 Chromatic Star
4 Ancient Stirrings
3 Chromatic Sphere
3 Explore
3 Timely Reinforcements
3 Nature's Claim
3 Relic of Progenitus
3 Surgical Extraction
3 Spellskite
1 Ghost Quarter
2 Torpor Orb
Changes would look like this
-4 Razorverge Thicket +4 Temple Garden
-2 Torpor Orb +1 Nature's Claim +1 Boil
-3 Relic of Progenitus +3 Leyline of Sanctity
Timely Reinforcements is completely main deckable and it saw play every game. With the hopeful inclusion of Shocklands next tournament it will almost always guarantee both effects as well.
Matchups
Round 1
vs 8 Rack
Game 1
Pretty much an autowin here, play out Karn, he can't do anything even with redirecting damage with Rack to Karn. But the guy also kept a one land hand so I am not sure what was up with that.
Game 2
board in +3 Nature's Claim +3 Surgical Extraction
He plays a turn 2 Pack Rats and I drop a natural Karn turn 3 exiling a land pass turn he drops a land plays Pithing Needle naming Karn and drops an Ensnaring Bridge his following turn. I end up dropping two Wurmcoil's immediately after the bridge stalling out the game until I resolved an Ugin and won.
1-0
Round 2
vs Burn splashing black
Game 1
He draws into enough direct damage spells and Skullcrack's my life gain and wins from Boros Charm and Bolt.
Game 2
Board in +3 Spellskites, +3 Nature's Claim, and +2 Surgical Extraction
Did not see any of these but drew into double Wurmcoil and double Timely Reinforcements and trounced him.
Game 3
Stalled the game out with Wurmcoil's and lots of lifegain and he couldn't get there.
2-0
Round 3
vs American Control
Essentially a long drawn out autoloss for the control player. I cannot remember the exact game but Remands and Mana Leaks do no not do a lot against me and I resolved a Timely Reinforcements twice in one game.
3-0 and First Place.
i've been playing tron for a few months now. i've mostly stuck to the stock list with 4 wurmcoils/pyro/o-stone and 3 relics. been doing pretty well most of the time in the local environment with some exceptions due to fumbled plays (new to the format).
in my testing of ugin i've found that when i'm able to land him that i've already had the game pretty well locked up. no doubt he is more powerful than an o-stone in many circumstances but i find that when i'm being disrupted that he just stares at me from my hand and taunts me. i never tested him too much instead of pyro because they are just too good in my meta; faeries, affinity, burn, rock, and a R/G ramp deck. rather useless against scapeshift and twin but i can't afford to leave them out of my MB as it is.
i would like to fit ugin somewhere in the sideboard but space is at a premium. i traded out 2 spellskites from the SB to replace a wurmcoil and a relic. i wish i could fit another ghost quarter in as well.
Congrats on the top 32 - looking forward to your list/report.
GX Tron XG
UR Phoenix RU
GG Freyalise High Tide GG
UR Parun Counterspells RU
BB Yawgmoth Token Storm BB
WB Pestilence BW
Sideboards are something that should never remain the same due to constant meta shifts, but considering we all play the same 54-56 cards and the same 7+ SB cards, siding is generally pretty straightforward once you play the deck for a while.
Some things to remember include:
1) Eye of Ugin is actually a 7-spell that also costs a land drop. Against any deck where the game is decided in the early-mid game (burn, Affinity, Boggles, Infect, etc.), you should SB out Eye and Emrakul.
2) For similar reasons, it is typical to SB out a pair of Sylvan Scrying if you need more space. This also applies if you are siding in several colored spells.
3) If the opponent is likely to SB in Stony Silence or Blood Moon, you should put in at least 2-3 Nature's Claim, even the full set if you have more weak cards in the MD. Both cards are backbreaking enough that having insurance against them is worth the possibility that they are bad life-gain spells.The
4) The first cards to look at to SB out are Ostones, Pyroclasms, and Relics. Ostone and Clasm are obv dead in several matchups, and Relic is the weakest of the consistency cards.
General cards that people often play and what they come in against. By no means comprehensive or what you should always do, just a guideline.
Affinity: -Eye -Emrakul -2 SylScry, -Relics +Natures Claim +Sweepers +Specific Hate (vandalblast/Grudge) +Spellskite
Junk: -Pyros -Spellskites +Natures Claims +4th Wurmcoil +any leftover Relics
Scapeshift: -Pyros -Ostones -Ugins -up to two Wurmcoils if you need +Boils +Slaughter GAmes +Defense Grid +SPellskite +any relics if you have cards leftover
Burn: -Ostones -Eye + Emrakul -2 SylScry +Claim +Spellskite +4th Wurmcoil +any other lifegain or cheap removal.
The Mirror: -Pyros -2 Wurmcoil +Claims +Spellskites +Slaughter GAmes
Twin: This is very dependant on what you have in the board, as often most of our SB can come in against Twin but it isn't neccesarily correct to weaken our own gameplan too much as they can still kill you with beats. -Pyros -Relics (if UR)- 2 SylScry -Eye + Emrakul -2 Wurmcoil if needed (but don't do this if you SB out Eye and Emrakul) +Natures Claim +Defense Grid +Spellskite +Combust +Torpor Orb (really poor card currently) + Boil. I personally find Slaughter Games to be a reasonable option but many think its a poor choice. A case could be made against KArn as karn is dependant on early Tron and doesn't stop the Combo.
Lots of things I didn't mention. If you want specific choices to take out against specific decks post a list and SB.
EDIT: Timely Reinforcements is a pretty strong card, but I doubt it is better than the entire suite of cards red has to offer. The fact that Grove of the Burnwillows is far and away the best dual land a deck like Tron could play is quite relevant, especially compared to things like shocklands, scars fastlands, and painlands.
I don't know if Path to Exile and Leyline of Sanctity are strong enough to justify white over red. White is certainly a million times better than red against Burn, but red is much stronger against fast aggro (pyroclasm) and combo (boil, Slaughter Games).
What match ups are ostones dead in? It seems like it would be decent against near everything other then burn
Trying new things like color splashes is one thing, but Wall of Omens is inferior to Spellskite when we take into account the colored-mana cost. Nobody loves drawing cards more than me but the fact that you either need a sphere or a white land to cast it makes it unplayable. Pyroclasm is a colored 2-drop but it typically wins the game when it is relevant, instead of cantriping + maybe gaining some life on our important second turn. The other colored 2-drop (Scrying) is a consitency card that allows the deck to function and a green spell instead of splash color. Spellskite fills a similar role as a blocker but also has a super-niche ability that is incredible in several of our awful matchups. When they print Wall of omens for 2 lets talk but the only reasons to splash white currently are Timely Reinforcements and Path to Exile, Leyline of Sanctity is questionable but possible. I can't think of any other value white brings opposed to red.
In order to play white effectively as a splash color over red you don't get to run Grove. There is a huge difference between Grove, which is really a Taiga, vs any other dual in modern. Other duals either cost life or tempo, both of which will lose you games. It is the same reason that everytime someone asks "can i use karpulsan instead of grove" they get a resounding "no".
Timely as a SB card in Gr Tron with a typical manabase, from personal experience (yes anecdotal evidence), is unfortunately not consistently castable to be worth the slots. It is game-changing against red decks, which are bad matchups, but unlike Slaughter Games, the matchups we want our hard-to-cast spell we don't have as much time to cast it AND SG cannot be interacted with. Against most other decks it not impactful enough to counteract the consistency issues. If we want more specific ammo for red decks, Feed the Clan is a good candidate.
@masterplum: another matchup where Ostone is an insta-out is Scapeshift. Reasonable to SB out a couple in the mirror.