Its not. I should have been more specific. These would be in addition to the pain lands. It would be the greediest of manabases with 12 Tron lands, 4 temples and 4 pain lands and 4 pain deserts. Greedy greedy greedy. Blood Moon would shut it down until game 2/3. Mostly just to facilitate 4 Ancient Stirrings and a single copy of World Breaker. It may even call for a 25th land a Wastes due to Path. I didn't say it was good. It just opens a possibility. It is better than Spire because Spire has an artifact condition to be met.
Splashing into G allows you efficient artifact/enchantment removal in the SB. Stony Silence wouldn't be so scary. Of course then Blood Moon becomes far more vicious. But I'd say there is far more Stony Silence in my meta than Blood Moon. World Breaker for me at least is tutor able by Conduit, hits artifacts/enchantments and lands, provides Reach AND can be cast off Temples.
Just a thought exercise for now. But 4 Ancient Stirrings would really help our deck a lot!
Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
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Hey all, a little late on the update, but I played in my local shop's FNM and wanted to give a rundown of the results. There were 19 total people playing and it went 5 rounds. My final record was 4-1 which was good enough for second place!
Thanks for the report and congrats on the results. I wish my LGS had 5 round events of that size. Mine has 3 round events every two weeks with 6-8 people. I found another shop that's about 40 minutes away that runs events weekly, not sure how big they are or how many rounds yet though.
Cool list you got there. Did Buried Ruin do anything for you? How about Hangarback Walker?
hi guys, i'm pretty new to the deck and set aside my gw tron for now wanting to try a tier 1 deck. what would be our worst matchups less than 50-50? i heard it was burn, not sure about affinity? DnT? counters company?
any idea on how to combat counters company?
i currently have todd stevens' list.
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plays Ad Nauseam and Amulet Bloom in Modern
"He traded sand for skins, skins for gold, gold for life. In the end, he traded life for sand."
—Afari, Tales
Its not. I should have been more specific. These would be in addition to the pain lands. It would be the greediest of manabases with 12 Tron lands, 4 temples and 4 pain lands and 4 pain deserts. Greedy greedy greedy. Blood Moon would shut it down until game 2/3. Mostly just to facilitate 4 Ancient Stirrings and a single copy of World Breaker. It may even call for a 25th land a Wastes due to Path. I didn't say it was good. It just opens a possibility. It is better than Spire because Spire has an artifact condition to be met.
Splashing into G allows you efficient artifact/enchantment removal in the SB. Stony Silence wouldn't be so scary. Of course then Blood Moon becomes far more vicious. But I'd say there is far more Stony Silence in my meta than Blood Moon. World Breaker for me at least is tutor able by Conduit, hits artifacts/enchantments and lands, provides Reach AND can be cast off Temples.
Just a thought exercise for now. But 4 Ancient Stirrings would really help our deck a lot!
If dropping all utility lands (which is probably not something I'd do), then going to 2 Forests and 2 Wastes for the last 4 could make sense.
I also was thinking, Cavern of Souls can be used to cast World Breaker...
Yeah, like I said I don't think an uber greedy manabase would be the answer. I do think at least 7 sources of G would be needed to reliably cast Ancient Stirrings and I'd feel better at 8. I don't think the end result as I've hypothesized would be worth the restructuring of the manabase. Its just that Stirrings is SO GOOD.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
Hey all, a little late on the update, but I played in my local shop's FNM and wanted to give a rundown of the results. There were 19 total people playing and it went 5 rounds. My final record was 4-1 which was good enough for second place!
Thanks for the report and congrats on the results. I wish my LGS had 5 round events of that size. Mine has 3 round events every two weeks with 6-8 people. I found another shop that's about 40 minutes away that runs events weekly, not sure how big they are or how many rounds yet though.
Cool list you got there. Did Buried Ruin do anything for you? How about Hangarback Walker?
Thanks TCH!
Yea our LGS fires Modern on Wednesdays and Fridays. My cousin went on wednesday last week and they had 19 players again, but capped at 4 rounds b/c of it being a weekday.
Buried ruin came into play a couple of times and I dont see me taking it out any time soon. I even misplayed a winning line because I didnt Map out the buried ruin to bring Balista back into play and the win. I will not let that slip by again! Walkers are good for decks that go wide and fast. There are a couple of those decks (green stompy, red/green bushwacker, even burn) that need to have blockers in the early game so that we can set up the mid to late game. Going turn two Walker to block, followed by an additional blocker for turn three where you might get lucky and pull a collar seems pretty good. The only caveat to walker is that it can have two targets for searing blaze but that doesnt happen too often. These fast and wide decks are our hardest challenge and I like hedging my SB against them.
So far so good with the deck!
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Legacy: Burn (18-6-1 over multiple events)
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
Having played tron for the past 3 years with varying versions of RG mono G and GW (none of them cookie cutter lists due to the UK meta being very aggro heavy) I can say that its hard to make a deck with chalice work with e maps and stirrings. Its too many dead draws and too hard to cast the stirrings on time. The great thing about Eldrazi tron (which I have on the way in the post) is that it has early plays so it doesn't just die to fast decks like tron almost always does, and it has great prison/tempo plays with the chalice and also the TKS. My tron lists gravitated towards all wraths and TKS to try to combat fast decks but the meta is so unfriendly now you need to be doing 'things' not just hoping turn 3 gives tron. I tried to shoehorn chalice into my tron deck so I could get the best of both worlds by shaving away the eggs in favour of prophetic prism so the 1 drops were only an 8 of and even with the reliable tron and stirrings it just didn't feel reliable as a cohesive deck. I am running a list with 2 mb hangarback and just one endbringer for eldrazi tron as the walker is really cool and early blockers are important as mentioned above.
Yes, if I were to run 4 Stirrings, Chalice would either go or head to the sideboard. Maybe its because of some of the games I've been playing recently that Chalice hasn't been doing a lot that is spurring my desire for Stirrings. The lure of filtering just seems like cheating almost.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
hi guys, i'm pretty new to the deck and set aside my gw tron for now wanting to try a tier 1 deck. what would be our worst matchups less than 50-50? i heard it was burn, not sure about affinity? DnT? counters company?
any idea on how to combat counters company?
i currently have todd stevens' list.
Matchups under 50/50 are Affinity (worst), Valakut, Elves, Hatebears, Humans, Eggs (if you ever see it). Ad Nauseam is very slightly unfavorable, as is Jund Shadow.
Burn is at least 60% for us; personally I'm around 70%.
Counters Company is probably under 50% as well. I haven't seen it enough to get enough data. It kinda got really popular for like a week then cooled off, but it's not too different from previous Abzan Company decks. I think it's unfavorable because they can assemble the combo so quickly with each piece only costing 2 mana, and if they do so, we only have 2-3 Dismembers game one to break it up. Ballista doesn't stop the combo if they play Druid first; try to ping Vizier once they're both in play and they can gain infinite mana in response. So you do want to prioritize neutralizing their combo pieces, but be aware and prepare for the fact that they have a good beatdown plan too. Your goal should be staying alive long enough to slam All is Dust. Post-board cut Smashers and bring in all the removal plus Pithing Needle.
Going to be making adjustments to the sideboard for this upcoming weekend, trying to get more spot removal and some more affinity hate as I'm seeing a lot of it on MODO. Four of my last 10 matches were against affinity and I lost all 4, mostly due to them chaining threats such as ravager and plating when I run out of answers/cards.
With 2 relics in the main, and a very tight sideboard, I don't see much of a loss in cutting 1 relic from the side. There are a few matchups where chalice on 1 and relic non-bo yet we still want some copies of both post-board, and personally I prefer to trim relics than chalices. Especially against grixis shadow where chalice on 1 is awesome. With 2 relics in the main and a third plus grafdiggers in the side I should be fine against dredge, storm, snapcatser decks, and CoCo decks. Crucible is really being brought in defensively against decks running fulminator in the side, and offensively against tron variants and valakut. However it really seems to do the best against Gx tron and valakut, everywhere else it feels kind of slow to play on T3. Even in the mirror you could be looking at 7+ power on the opponents board by the time you can cast it and at that point you're not catching up in board state if you're chaining ghost quarters. It seems like crucible is a little narrow at the moment. You guys have any thoughts on this?
I definitely want more spot removal for affinity, burn, devoted druid, and other go wide decks. Spot removal is something we definitely lack in the 75. And a second pithing needle should shore up affinity quite a bit. Turning off their plating, ravager, or manlands early in the game is a reliable way to buy enough time to stabilize, and increasing the odds of a pithing in the opening hand or first couple of turns helps accomplish that. Both pithing and contorttion are going to be relevant in a hell of a lot more matchups than crucible.
Yeah, definitely feel the same way about needing more spot removal, and that the 4th Relic is expendable. I've been on 3 for a while. Agree that Crucible is nice, but unnecessary. I just cut 1 Crucible and 1 Hangarback to add 2 Contortions. This is my current list:
The first match I played after changing the sideboard was affinity, making it 5 of my last 11 on MODO! Game 1 I grinded through it with chalice on 0, 2, and tron + Ballista on T5 or 6. Game 2 he got there on T6 with double Blinkmoth's with Plating one one of them, a slow win for affinity and if I had tron active for my ballista or more GQ's I maybe would have turned the corner with the smasher I was holding in hand but had to spend mana to survive. Game 3 my opening hand and draws were INSANE and I still barely got there because the opponent drew really well with plating and ravagers. My opening hand was: 2x chalice, 1x Wail, 1x pithing, 1x ballista, 2x lands one of which was GQ. This hand is as good as it gets on the play. T1 I led with chalice on zero and tronland, he plays a land and springleaf and passes. T2 I play GQ and pass, I drew a second tronland here, he plays skirge and a land and then taps it to cast plating, I wail the skirge with plating on the stack. On my T3 I draw a spatial contortion, I play the 2nd tronland and play needle naming plating, thinking I've got to have the game pretty well taken care of at this point after shutting down his 0 cost cards and his T2 creature play and his plating. I hold up two mana for contortion and pass, he plays ravager on T3 and another springleaf drum and passes. His end step I contortion on the ravager so he has to sac his two drums and his plating to make it survive, leaving him with a board of glimmervoid, the indestructible artifact land, and a 4/4 ravager. My T4 I draw my 4th land and play chalice on 2, letting him swing in with his 4/4 for a turn or two seems fine and his hand his empty at this point. I forget the rest and my MODO game VOD crashed when I tried to watch it. but I eventually landed a second pithing naming ravager, locking it as a 6/6. He get a master of etherium and I activate tron off a reshaper trigger while chumping and can finally cast ballista for x=5 to remove the 3/3 master. I take one more turn of beats from the ravager down to 2 life, because I know the next turn I can pump ballista a couple times and trade 2 pings + TKS for it rather than do the same thing right now but lose the ballista. I had already had chalice on 0 and 2 and pithing on plating and ravager on the battlefield at this point, his draws are dead AF and my hand is empty so ballista is my win condition. I swing in once with him and opponent is at 15 life. He draws inkmoth which as first is a panic attack for me because I'm at 2 life with no more GQ's (I used mine earlier on a blinkmoth when he went to activate it to prevent him from saccing it to ravager), but then am relieved the poor bastard has infect and I'm not on a 2 turn clock. I draw smasher and beat him down in 2 turns for the win. I drew so many hate cards, was on the play, led with chalice on zero, and still barely came out victorious on T9. It was insane, I was expecting to blow him out with that hand but he only drew 2-4 dead cards to both chalices all game (not counting his 2 drops before T4). Affinity is something we need a heavy sideboard for because all is dust is our best maindeck answer to go-wide decks and it's dead here, and 2x dismembers is not even close to enough spot removal to slow affinity.
Your list is really close to mine, the biggest difference is the Ugin in my side rather than all is dust #3. I think in matchups like elves and dredge in particular it's worth the uptick in casting cost due to the blowout and pretty much guaranteed victory if it resolves. There's also BW tokens which you can keep spamming downtick on 0 to keep them from establishing a board, and against go-wide decks multiple board wipes (or the threat of it as well as bolts to creatures while upticking for an ult) ends the game rather than resets it like AiD. A big factor is in many of these go-wide strategies I'm mentioning, they don't pack much hate for our assembling of tron generally so a T4-T6 Ugin isn't all that rare. I like him in the side to bring in as my third board wipe, or in matchups like Eldrazi and Taxes I'll remove one AiD in favor of Ugin because of the bolt. I do keep the other AiD in because they have plenty of white colored creatures as well, not just TKS, displacer, and strangler.
Speaking of taxes decks, I have been seeing Eldrazi n Taxes, UW taxes, mono W taxes, just pretty much all kinds of colors with vials + ETB creatures + arbiter/land destruction all over the place and the spatial contortion helps this alot. We need 1-2 cost 1 for 1's with their thalias, arbiters, and displacers early in the game. And this matchup is no bueno with chalices being blanked by vial, and with all their land destruction and arbiter. The second pithing needle should help here as well to mainly name vial on T1 or T2 in response to them playing the Vial on T1, but also could name GQ or displacer or w/e else. Have you guys been seeing many of these decks? Reshaper is an allstar here because we need extra draws for extra lands, and cards in general to deal with their pressure from playing creatures off of vial and their lands and flooding the board.
Edit: just wanted to add that I faced taxes twice in my last 11 matches, adding to the 5 affinity that's 7 of 11 that are both helped immensly by spot removal and multiple pithing needles or a needle in the opening hand.
Honestly I feel the opposite on Hangarback. It's solid in a lot of matchups, but there aren't any situations that I'm really excited to bring it in. The mirror would be one but I'm not running into it much. I'm fine with 1 ATM. And I'd feel so naked without a 3rd All is Dust Way too many go wide strategies right now.
That being said, Tituba may be on to something with Ugin. Normally I'd say it's incorrect because it's so hard to cast, but this meta may call for it.
do you run a singleton basilisk collar for burn? or it's just 1 or 2 on the sideboard? dou you win games against burn with no chalice during the game?
how about lantern control? any tricks up our sleeve on a resolved ensnaring bridge? and 2 needles naming both endbringer and walking ballista? i guess a turn 2 chalice is keepable but they also play 6-7 discard spells so it might be too late to play it on 1. plus they have spelllskites and welding jar for our ratchet bombs.
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"He traded sand for skins, skins for gold, gold for life. In the end, he traded life for sand."
—Afari, Tales
Honestly I feel the opposite on Hangarback. It's solid in a lot of matchups, but there aren't any situations that I'm really excited to bring it in. The mirror would be one but I'm not running into it much. I'm fine with 1 ATM. And I'd feel so naked without a 3rd All is Dust Way too many go wide strategies right now.
That being said, Tituba may be on to something with Ugin. Normally I'd say it's incorrect because it's so hard to cast, but this meta may call for it.
TBH I agree that Hangarback is solid but not very exciting. It is really there to buy an extra turn or so with some long term benefit. I'm not sure what I would put in it's place. It could be another spatial contortion I guess but I'm not convinced that is really much better (overall). What are your thoughts on its replacement?
Similar to what your saying though regarding all is dust, I play a MB Ugin and I love it (no 3rd AiD SB). There are a few occasions that it has sat in my hand b/c of mana issues but it has an even greater impact than all is dust and worth it IMO. I'm not quite ready to remove it (plus it exiles the permanents which is valuable and it at least pings for 3 against other colorless decks (creature or opponent) as opposed to all is dust which really does nothing against those decks). That said, I likely am removing it anyway in games 2/3 against most colorless decks...hmmm
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Legacy: Burn (18-6-1 over multiple events)
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
I'm also interested in exploring white as an option.
replacing:
1 cavern
2 wastes
2 GQ
1 Nephalia Academy
with:
4 Caves of Koilos
2 Plains
then packing 3 stony in the board.
it could just be a pipe dream though.
The problem w/ stony is that it shuts off a lot of our cards: Map, Ballista, Ratchet, Relic, and Batterskull (if played). I feel like that is way too much...
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Legacy: Burn (18-6-1 over multiple events)
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
do you run a singleton basilisk collar for burn? or it's just 1 or 2 on the sideboard? dou you win games against burn with no chalice during the game?
how about lantern control? any tricks up our sleeve on a resolved ensnaring bridge? and 2 needles naming both endbringer and walking ballista? i guess a turn 2 chalice is keepable but they also play 6-7 discard spells so it might be too late to play it on 1. plus they have spelllskites and welding jar for our ratchet bombs.
If I may chime in, Burn is real tough without chalice when they have a good hand. I still kinda like 1 Collar in my MB and 1 in SB for this matchup plus I added a dragons claw for the fast red decks.
I've played lantern a couple of times and the likelihood that they're able to play two needles and an ensnaring bridge plus have a welding jar to prevent destruction of their artifacts from a ratchet seems like a God hand. Ideally we could have something on board to either prevent this from happening or force them to play a different game by being aggressive early. Additionally, if you play Karn, it should be able to make an impact once it is played (I play Ugin which can ping for 3 a turn). Also, use warping wail on their spellskites and you can pithing needle their welding jar (or other problematic artifacts).
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Legacy: Burn (18-6-1 over multiple events)
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
do you run a singleton basilisk collar for burn? or it's just 1 or 2 on the sideboard? dou you win games against burn with no chalice during the game?
how about lantern control? any tricks up our sleeve on a resolved ensnaring bridge? and 2 needles naming both endbringer and walking ballista? i guess a turn 2 chalice is keepable but they also play 6-7 discard spells so it might be too late to play it on 1. plus they have spelllskites and welding jar for our ratchet bombs.
Happy to help.
Yeah I just have 1 Collar in the side for Burn. Well it's not for Burn in particular, it comes in in a lot of other scenarios, but yeah. You can definitely win without Chalice, Thought-Knot Seer being the other key card, but I think it's hard to keep a hand without one of those cards if you know they're on Burn. Fortunately that's 8 cards out of 60 so the chances we see one in the opening 7 or after a mulligan is very high. They have a lot of situational cards post-board like Destructive Revelry, Deflecting Palm, and Path, which slows them down a lot and gives us time to set up Chalice on 2, and TKS is key for seeing what we're dealing with in particular. But you steal a good amount of Game 1's just by having Chalice in your opener and playing it on turn 2.
Lantern is a really dumb matchup. I think in most cases it just comes down to how the opening hands match up. Chalice on 1 is basically game-winning if they don't have Decay, or don't discard it first. Ratchet Bomb on 1 is similarly devastating to them. But sometimes they just go Thoughtseize, Lantern, Codex Shredder, Pithing Needle, Pithing Needle, then find Bridge and we have no chance. In the scenario you listed we can still Karn them, but it all depends how much of a prison they have set up already. Feels like a really low-skill matchup to me, basically a coinflip. I don't like seeing it. This is another matchup where having access to Ugin would be nice, because they only have so many Pithing Needles
I've been eyeballing this deck for awhile as it's been recommended to me multiple times over. But I had a couple of questions before I take the plunge.
1: What is the purpose of the 1 Wurmcoil Engine on the sideboard? I simply don't get it.
2: If you couldn't play with any Chalice's, what would you do? I'm asking as even if price wasn't a concern, they simply can't be found locally.
Wurmcoil Engine is good because it's a 3-for-1 blocker/aggro machine. Deathtouch is relevant against bigger creatures like DS. Lifelink is never bad. It's somewhat situational and hard to cast, but seems decent in this meta.
Chalice is super important IMHO. Without it, you would probably be better off playing green-based Tron with Ancient Stirrings. Just go all-in on big mana.
Ratrek: WRT Wurmcoil and Chalice, I believe TCH is exactly right.
As far as the availability of Chalice, that is what the internet is for (thank you Al Gore :P).
Chalice is an integral part of the Eldrazi Tron strategy. It is one of the, what I call "core pieces of the deck" that needs to be a 3 or 4-of in the MD.
On the topic of MD and SB, this deck should be built to your local meta and if you strictly play MTGO, 1. That is too bad 2. You really need to build your deck like you are taking to a large competitive event (so a stock list) if you want to be the most competitive.
There are your core pieces: all of the Tron lands, some number of Ghost Quarter (I like 4), 2 Wastes, 4 Temples, 4 TKS, 4 Smasher, 4 Reshaper, 4 Ballista (I have seen people suggest 3, but I think that is wrong), at least 3 Chalice, 4 Maps, at least 1 (but no more than 2) Karn, 2-3 Endbringer, 2-3 Dismember, some number of AiD, and at least 2 Mindstone (I know some people on here have taken it out, but I feel that is just greedy and wrong).
The rest needs to be tooled to your local meta. So if you are seeing an uptick in Affinity in your meta, Rachet Bomb is a fantastic choice for a MD flex spot or two. If you have a lot of Burn In your local meta, a MD Basilisk Collar and/or Batterskull are great options. This could also work if you have a lot of aggro at your LGS.
Running into a lot of Dredge, Storm, or Death's Shadow (especially Grixis) or some combination of the 3? MD relics are great. Furthermore, if you are seeing a lot of GDS (still seems like the most popular deck in Modern) then you are crazy not to follow a Todd Stevens build and SB plan. This is a guy who has played the deck a lot, tested the deck a lot, and won with the deck a lot. He developed a SB strategy for the GDS matchup that has worked so well; so well, in fact, that in his run to the Open victory, he did not lose 1 match to GDS and he also stopped losing to it in playtesting and grinding on MTGO. I have read on this board posters saying, "I feel like I don't need 4 Relics." This is correct if your meta does not include much GDS, but if it does or you are taking E Tron to an Open or a larger tournament, there is no excuse-other than being so stubbornly independent that it hurts your win ratio-not to follow his plan.
So in short, E Tron should be built for your local meta, if you play on MTGO play a more stock list, and listen to Todd Stevens on how to beat the (current) most popular deck in Modern.
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Its not. I should have been more specific. These would be in addition to the pain lands. It would be the greediest of manabases with 12 Tron lands, 4 temples and 4 pain lands and 4 pain deserts. Greedy greedy greedy. Blood Moon would shut it down until game 2/3. Mostly just to facilitate 4 Ancient Stirrings and a single copy of World Breaker. It may even call for a 25th land a Wastes due to Path. I didn't say it was good. It just opens a possibility. It is better than Spire because Spire has an artifact condition to be met.
Splashing into G allows you efficient artifact/enchantment removal in the SB. Stony Silence wouldn't be so scary. Of course then Blood Moon becomes far more vicious. But I'd say there is far more Stony Silence in my meta than Blood Moon. World Breaker for me at least is tutor able by Conduit, hits artifacts/enchantments and lands, provides Reach AND can be cast off Temples.
Just a thought exercise for now. But 4 Ancient Stirrings would really help our deck a lot!
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
Thanks for the report and congrats on the results. I wish my LGS had 5 round events of that size. Mine has 3 round events every two weeks with 6-8 people. I found another shop that's about 40 minutes away that runs events weekly, not sure how big they are or how many rounds yet though.
Cool list you got there. Did Buried Ruin do anything for you? How about Hangarback Walker?
any idea on how to combat counters company?
i currently have todd stevens' list.
"He traded sand for skins, skins for gold, gold for life. In the end, he traded life for sand."
—Afari, Tales
If dropping all utility lands (which is probably not something I'd do), then going to 2 Forests and 2 Wastes for the last 4 could make sense.
I also was thinking, Cavern of Souls can be used to cast World Breaker...
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
Thanks TCH!
Yea our LGS fires Modern on Wednesdays and Fridays. My cousin went on wednesday last week and they had 19 players again, but capped at 4 rounds b/c of it being a weekday.
Buried ruin came into play a couple of times and I dont see me taking it out any time soon. I even misplayed a winning line because I didnt Map out the buried ruin to bring Balista back into play and the win. I will not let that slip by again! Walkers are good for decks that go wide and fast. There are a couple of those decks (green stompy, red/green bushwacker, even burn) that need to have blockers in the early game so that we can set up the mid to late game. Going turn two Walker to block, followed by an additional blocker for turn three where you might get lucky and pull a collar seems pretty good. The only caveat to walker is that it can have two targets for searing blaze but that doesnt happen too often. These fast and wide decks are our hardest challenge and I like hedging my SB against them.
So far so good with the deck!
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
Yes, if I were to run 4 Stirrings, Chalice would either go or head to the sideboard. Maybe its because of some of the games I've been playing recently that Chalice hasn't been doing a lot that is spurring my desire for Stirrings. The lure of filtering just seems like cheating almost.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
Matchups under 50/50 are Affinity (worst), Valakut, Elves, Hatebears, Humans, Eggs (if you ever see it). Ad Nauseam is very slightly unfavorable, as is Jund Shadow.
Burn is at least 60% for us; personally I'm around 70%.
Counters Company is probably under 50% as well. I haven't seen it enough to get enough data. It kinda got really popular for like a week then cooled off, but it's not too different from previous Abzan Company decks. I think it's unfavorable because they can assemble the combo so quickly with each piece only costing 2 mana, and if they do so, we only have 2-3 Dismembers game one to break it up. Ballista doesn't stop the combo if they play Druid first; try to ping Vizier once they're both in play and they can gain infinite mana in response. So you do want to prioritize neutralizing their combo pieces, but be aware and prepare for the fact that they have a good beatdown plan too. Your goal should be staying alive long enough to slam All is Dust. Post-board cut Smashers and bring in all the removal plus Pithing Needle.
Before changes:
2 relics
2 hangar
2 wail
1 graf
1 ugin
1 wurm
2 surg
1 ratchet
1 pithing
1 crucible
1 basilisk
Changes I'm thinking of making:
-1 relic
-1 crucible
+1 pithing
+1 contortion
With 2 relics in the main, and a very tight sideboard, I don't see much of a loss in cutting 1 relic from the side. There are a few matchups where chalice on 1 and relic non-bo yet we still want some copies of both post-board, and personally I prefer to trim relics than chalices. Especially against grixis shadow where chalice on 1 is awesome. With 2 relics in the main and a third plus grafdiggers in the side I should be fine against dredge, storm, snapcatser decks, and CoCo decks. Crucible is really being brought in defensively against decks running fulminator in the side, and offensively against tron variants and valakut. However it really seems to do the best against Gx tron and valakut, everywhere else it feels kind of slow to play on T3. Even in the mirror you could be looking at 7+ power on the opponents board by the time you can cast it and at that point you're not catching up in board state if you're chaining ghost quarters. It seems like crucible is a little narrow at the moment. You guys have any thoughts on this?
I definitely want more spot removal for affinity, burn, devoted druid, and other go wide decks. Spot removal is something we definitely lack in the 75. And a second pithing needle should shore up affinity quite a bit. Turning off their plating, ravager, or manlands early in the game is a reliable way to buy enough time to stabilize, and increasing the odds of a pithing in the opening hand or first couple of turns helps accomplish that. Both pithing and contorttion are going to be relevant in a hell of a lot more matchups than crucible.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
4 Thought-Knot Seer
4 Reality Smasher
2 Endbringer
4 Walking Ballista
2 Karn Liberated
2 Ratchet Bomb
2 Relic of Progenitus
4 Expedition Map
4 Chalice of the Void
2 Dismember
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Tower
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Eldrazi Temple
3 Ghost Quarter
2 Cavern of Souls
1 Sea Gate Wreckage
2 Wastes
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Warping Wail
1 Basilisk Collar
1 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Spatial Contortion
1 Hangarback Walker
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Pithing Needle
Your list is really close to mine, the biggest difference is the Ugin in my side rather than all is dust #3. I think in matchups like elves and dredge in particular it's worth the uptick in casting cost due to the blowout and pretty much guaranteed victory if it resolves. There's also BW tokens which you can keep spamming downtick on 0 to keep them from establishing a board, and against go-wide decks multiple board wipes (or the threat of it as well as bolts to creatures while upticking for an ult) ends the game rather than resets it like AiD. A big factor is in many of these go-wide strategies I'm mentioning, they don't pack much hate for our assembling of tron generally so a T4-T6 Ugin isn't all that rare. I like him in the side to bring in as my third board wipe, or in matchups like Eldrazi and Taxes I'll remove one AiD in favor of Ugin because of the bolt. I do keep the other AiD in because they have plenty of white colored creatures as well, not just TKS, displacer, and strangler.
Speaking of taxes decks, I have been seeing Eldrazi n Taxes, UW taxes, mono W taxes, just pretty much all kinds of colors with vials + ETB creatures + arbiter/land destruction all over the place and the spatial contortion helps this alot. We need 1-2 cost 1 for 1's with their thalias, arbiters, and displacers early in the game. And this matchup is no bueno with chalices being blanked by vial, and with all their land destruction and arbiter. The second pithing needle should help here as well to mainly name vial on T1 or T2 in response to them playing the Vial on T1, but also could name GQ or displacer or w/e else. Have you guys been seeing many of these decks? Reshaper is an allstar here because we need extra draws for extra lands, and cards in general to deal with their pressure from playing creatures off of vial and their lands and flooding the board.
Edit: just wanted to add that I faced taxes twice in my last 11 matches, adding to the 5 affinity that's 7 of 11 that are both helped immensly by spot removal and multiple pithing needles or a needle in the opening hand.
WG G/W Tron GW
BG G/B Tron GB
GG Mono G Tron GG
RG G/R Tron GR
That being said, Tituba may be on to something with Ugin. Normally I'd say it's incorrect because it's so hard to cast, but this meta may call for it.
do you run a singleton basilisk collar for burn? or it's just 1 or 2 on the sideboard? dou you win games against burn with no chalice during the game?
how about lantern control? any tricks up our sleeve on a resolved ensnaring bridge? and 2 needles naming both endbringer and walking ballista? i guess a turn 2 chalice is keepable but they also play 6-7 discard spells so it might be too late to play it on 1. plus they have spelllskites and welding jar for our ratchet bombs.
"He traded sand for skins, skins for gold, gold for life. In the end, he traded life for sand."
—Afari, Tales
TBH I agree that Hangarback is solid but not very exciting. It is really there to buy an extra turn or so with some long term benefit. I'm not sure what I would put in it's place. It could be another spatial contortion I guess but I'm not convinced that is really much better (overall). What are your thoughts on its replacement?
Similar to what your saying though regarding all is dust, I play a MB Ugin and I love it (no 3rd AiD SB). There are a few occasions that it has sat in my hand b/c of mana issues but it has an even greater impact than all is dust and worth it IMO. I'm not quite ready to remove it (plus it exiles the permanents which is valuable and it at least pings for 3 against other colorless decks (creature or opponent) as opposed to all is dust which really does nothing against those decks). That said, I likely am removing it anyway in games 2/3 against most colorless decks...hmmm
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
The problem w/ stony is that it shuts off a lot of our cards: Map, Ballista, Ratchet, Relic, and Batterskull (if played). I feel like that is way too much...
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
If I may chime in, Burn is real tough without chalice when they have a good hand. I still kinda like 1 Collar in my MB and 1 in SB for this matchup plus I added a dragons claw for the fast red decks.
I've played lantern a couple of times and the likelihood that they're able to play two needles and an ensnaring bridge plus have a welding jar to prevent destruction of their artifacts from a ratchet seems like a God hand. Ideally we could have something on board to either prevent this from happening or force them to play a different game by being aggressive early. Additionally, if you play Karn, it should be able to make an impact once it is played (I play Ugin which can ping for 3 a turn). Also, use warping wail on their spellskites and you can pithing needle their welding jar (or other problematic artifacts).
Eldrazi and Taxes (under construction)
Modern: Eldrazi Tron (All sanctioned events; Record: 38-9-2 over ~12 Wed/Fri Night Modern events: 78% match win rate; last updated 9.13.17)
Jeskai Harbinger
Naya Burn (20-6-2 over multiple 1K and FNM events; retired)
Building: Esper control and a mill deck for fun and some variety.
Happy to help.
Yeah I just have 1 Collar in the side for Burn. Well it's not for Burn in particular, it comes in in a lot of other scenarios, but yeah. You can definitely win without Chalice, Thought-Knot Seer being the other key card, but I think it's hard to keep a hand without one of those cards if you know they're on Burn. Fortunately that's 8 cards out of 60 so the chances we see one in the opening 7 or after a mulligan is very high. They have a lot of situational cards post-board like Destructive Revelry, Deflecting Palm, and Path, which slows them down a lot and gives us time to set up Chalice on 2, and TKS is key for seeing what we're dealing with in particular. But you steal a good amount of Game 1's just by having Chalice in your opener and playing it on turn 2.
Lantern is a really dumb matchup. I think in most cases it just comes down to how the opening hands match up. Chalice on 1 is basically game-winning if they don't have Decay, or don't discard it first. Ratchet Bomb on 1 is similarly devastating to them. But sometimes they just go Thoughtseize, Lantern, Codex Shredder, Pithing Needle, Pithing Needle, then find Bridge and we have no chance. In the scenario you listed we can still Karn them, but it all depends how much of a prison they have set up already. Feels like a really low-skill matchup to me, basically a coinflip. I don't like seeing it. This is another matchup where having access to Ugin would be nice, because they only have so many Pithing Needles
I've been eyeballing this deck for awhile as it's been recommended to me multiple times over. But I had a couple of questions before I take the plunge.
1: What is the purpose of the 1 Wurmcoil Engine on the sideboard? I simply don't get it.
2: If you couldn't play with any Chalice's, what would you do? I'm asking as even if price wasn't a concern, they simply can't be found locally.
Modern: Storm
Legacy: ANT
Chalice is super important IMHO. Without it, you would probably be better off playing green-based Tron with Ancient Stirrings. Just go all-in on big mana.
As far as the availability of Chalice, that is what the internet is for (thank you Al Gore :P).
Chalice is an integral part of the Eldrazi Tron strategy. It is one of the, what I call "core pieces of the deck" that needs to be a 3 or 4-of in the MD.
On the topic of MD and SB, this deck should be built to your local meta and if you strictly play MTGO, 1. That is too bad 2. You really need to build your deck like you are taking to a large competitive event (so a stock list) if you want to be the most competitive.
There are your core pieces: all of the Tron lands, some number of Ghost Quarter (I like 4), 2 Wastes, 4 Temples, 4 TKS, 4 Smasher, 4 Reshaper, 4 Ballista (I have seen people suggest 3, but I think that is wrong), at least 3 Chalice, 4 Maps, at least 1 (but no more than 2) Karn, 2-3 Endbringer, 2-3 Dismember, some number of AiD, and at least 2 Mindstone (I know some people on here have taken it out, but I feel that is just greedy and wrong).
The rest needs to be tooled to your local meta. So if you are seeing an uptick in Affinity in your meta, Rachet Bomb is a fantastic choice for a MD flex spot or two. If you have a lot of Burn In your local meta, a MD Basilisk Collar and/or Batterskull are great options. This could also work if you have a lot of aggro at your LGS.
Running into a lot of Dredge, Storm, or Death's Shadow (especially Grixis) or some combination of the 3? MD relics are great. Furthermore, if you are seeing a lot of GDS (still seems like the most popular deck in Modern) then you are crazy not to follow a Todd Stevens build and SB plan. This is a guy who has played the deck a lot, tested the deck a lot, and won with the deck a lot. He developed a SB strategy for the GDS matchup that has worked so well; so well, in fact, that in his run to the Open victory, he did not lose 1 match to GDS and he also stopped losing to it in playtesting and grinding on MTGO. I have read on this board posters saying, "I feel like I don't need 4 Relics." This is correct if your meta does not include much GDS, but if it does or you are taking E Tron to an Open or a larger tournament, there is no excuse-other than being so stubbornly independent that it hurts your win ratio-not to follow his plan.
So in short, E Tron should be built for your local meta, if you play on MTGO play a more stock list, and listen to Todd Stevens on how to beat the (current) most popular deck in Modern.