I’m going to be playing this at the SCG in Columbus this weekend, this is the list I’m tentatively sleeving up:
28 Creatures
2 Archfiend of Ifnir
4 Desert Ceradon
4 Horror of the Broken Lands
4 Monstrous Carabid
4 Street Wraith
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Fulminator Mage
2 Faerie Macabre
14 Spells
4 Violent Outburst
4 Demonic Dread
3 Living End
3 Beast Within
18 Lands
4 Blackcleave Cliffs
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Stomping Ground
1 Blood Crypt
2 Grove of the Burnwillow
2 Swamp
1 Forest
Sideboard
2 Ricochet Trap
3 Ingot Chewer
3 Blood Moon
1 Slaughter Games
1 Lost Legacy
2 Faerie Macabre
1 Shriekmaw
1 Beast Within
1 Krosan Grip
Preface:
Meta has been shifting very heavily towards TitanShift, Jeskai, and Tron lately so I’m expecting a higher number of those decks to be present.
I’m also expecting some number of people to be metagaming for those, so the decks I’d objectively put myself on in that meta are: Storm, Taxes, Ad Nauseum, Burn, Affinity, and any Through the Breach deck (Grishoalbrand picking up steam in local level events).
Logic for Choices:
Archfiend of Ifnir was garbage as a 4-of, I’ll never make that mistake again. However, in a meta that I’m predicting will have at least a fair share of small creature decks, I’ve determined I like him in play more than Shriekmaw — his flying body has provided some reach against a clogged ground game, his ability has killed a lethal etched champion, and overall I’ve been alright with two in the list. If I took them out, it would probably be for 2 Shriekmaw or 1 Shriekmaw-1 Faerie Macabre — as it stands, I like killing blockers before combat.
3rd Beast Within MB is a concession to U/x decks and Big Mana decks, while still hedging minorly against Storm, Ad Naus, and random decks looking to put lock pieces into play. The 4th is currently in my SB, I’m considering swapping that for a Kolaghan’s Command as a direct upgrade against Affinity.
Skriewmaw is there for the BGx opponents, as well as anyone trying to play a heavy creature synergy deck (Vizier, GW Value, Humans, Fish, etc).
Krosan Grip is hands down the best way to remove Relic, and I think that’s going to be the most prevalent GY Hate going into this weekend. It also brings splash damage against Arcbound Ravager, decks trying to protect their lock piece (Lantern, UWx), and Split Second also gets around an opponent blinking the permanent in question (Flickerwisp shenanigans).
Lost Legacy is great against TitanShift, but Slaughter Games is better against Storm and Ad Nauseum (and Krark Clan, randomly). Slaughter Games can also lock away a game by ripping Ensnaring Bridge against Lantern, I’m actually considering a second one because of that.
2 Faerie is concession to not only opposing GY based strategies, but also opponents trying to Surgical Living End. It occasionally provides splash damage by removing opponents creatures from GY when we cascade, and a handful of times it has also provided GG by triggering Horror before damage.
Blood Moon shores up the TitanShift matchup, makes BGx decks look pathetic, turns Grixis Death Shadow into a pile of garbage, and brings splash damage against opponents trying to assemble tron the classic way. Strongly considered MBing this, not sold on that though.
Ingot Chewer is our best hate answer, I’m considering the 4th one over the Krosan Grip simply because of the body it provides. It’s also R, meaning it’s easier to use under Blood Moon, and it recurs against Affinity — the 4th is heavy on my mind.
Ricochet Trap is simply a blowout every time I cast it, I’ve never had an opponent play around it when I have just one R up — or especially when I have no mana available, and I get to exile SSG for the blowout. I’ve also randomly saved myself from an exact storm kill, kept a remand from hitting a Grapeshot, redirected a Surgical to remove my opponents Supreme Verdicts, and against Ponza nuked their land with the enchantment stacked on. I’ve tried three but it always clogs — two is strong enough for me.
Thoughts?? Who am I seeing there this weekend?
[bold] Update: 11 “Game Ones” in testing tonight[/bold]
6 Games against Red Affinity
5 Games against Fetchless Storm
3-3 Against Affinity. Two games I had GG but punted to something I “could” have prevented: one game I was greedy and didn’t cascade t3, he topdecked Plating and infect killed me; the other game I had him to 3 life (me at 6) with 18 power in play, I could’ve Beast Within’ed or Fulminator’ed his 2nd colored source to take him off Red mana. He topdecks 2nd galv blast (last card in hand was also galv blast) for GG. Technically he should’ve won that one, but I should’ve taken the line for Best chances anyway.
4-2 Against Storm, both losses were because I got impatient and tried rushing the game. My group has decided that if you have interaction of any kind, it’s best to wait out the Storm player. Both games where I “blinked first”, I lost — the four games where I just kept stocking my yard while I held up Beast Within or Faerie Macabre, I won.
Takeaways:
-The 2-of Faerie Macabre singlehandedly won me three of the 11 games and played a big role in two others. Very happy with it over Shriekmaw
-A t3 cascade against Affinity is a priority no matter what my GY is. Fulminator On t3 is just not as effective as killing their guys who can pick up plating or Feed Ravager next turn.
-Archfiend singlehandedly was responsible for beating an affinity draw that had me dead to infect on t3; my only cascade was Demonic Dread, instead of throwing t2 double Ceradon I threw Ifnir and was able to exile SSG to cycle Ceradon and kill his Inkmoth. 2 is still clunky but I want to see it more
-Kommand is missed against Affinity, but nuking Baral out of storm made up for it. Happy to hit Lands there also.
I like your list and completely agree with your current assessment of the meta. My lgs likes to shift rapidly and I'm seeing a few burn, storm, lantern, Tron, merfolk, affinity, control varients, and jund.
What do you consider your good, even, or bad matchups? I have a hard time with storm, what exactly are you targeting with beast within and faerie macabre? Do you have any experience/tips vs lantern?
Good: creature decks, I’m pretty confident Against emrakul decks too but idk how everyone else feels
Even: Decks with a card MB that hoses us (Meddling Mage, chalice of the void, scavenging ooze, et al)
Bad: Affinity, storm, scapeshift, true control decks (Jeskai tempo is laughably easy if you play tight)
Re: Storm
Depends on state and play/draw. If I’m on the play and I can t2 destroy a land, I’ll prioritize the mana denial play. On the draw, I do my best to only cascade off of Outburst and only when I have lethal in 2 attacks. I prioritize leaving Beast Within up on their turn over anything else honestly. They get their dude in play, ritual, ritual, Beast Within. With Faerie, I put Pif in GY and give them the rituals to try and “get em” with Faerie Macabre. You won’t have priority until they go to cast a different spell, so a smart one will flash Pif back first. If they don’t, exile it and any grapeshots they have. Barring grapeshots, hit remands. Missing those, the options in order of highest to lowest priority to exile: manamorphose, then gifts, then desperate ritual, then pyretic ritual.
Re: Lantern
The MU is very dependent on them having an early Bridge and it sticking around. I blaze through turns 1-3, once I’ve cascaded I stop cycling and start saving the draws for getting a Beast Within off the top. You can also fetch to hide it if you don’t have cyclers yet, but that’s the worst case scenario because there’s no guarantee you’ll find it again before they find a second bridge.
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Personally all of my most broken games involve a SSG so id never play less than 4. I’d also prefer Fulminator to Shriekmaw because of TitanShift and tron
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It won’t let me post anything, keeps saying “error, it’s our fault, if you’d like to report it here is the reference code” — EDIT this one went through! I lost to affinity, Jund deaths shadow, and Eldrazi Tron. Beat affinity, Jeskai tempo x2 and GW something. Could’ve beat Jund DS but I didn’t do what I was supposed to. Could’ve beat affinity but I misplayed three turns in a row. Eldrazi Tron started G2 and g3 with t1 chalice + relic, it was still long and close games but misplays took me out of it
Tl;dr — 4-3 drop, I was sick as a dog and tried to power through it with an assortment of Claritin, DayQuil, acetaminophen, and caffeine but to no avail. I felt blackout drunk by round 4 lol. Made a lot of play mistakes that I (mostly) immediately recognized, some that I didn’t recognize until much later when I wasn’t dying from mucus overload + fever.
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Major changes for me are moving the Shriekmaw to the board, shaving a Fulminator, bringing back 2 Archfiend, and making concessions to the U meta with my sideboard. Also, I finally cut the 19th land for a 4 SSG, because, as others have noted, it's how you beat opposing combo decks. You simply have to get on the board vs Valakut, Ad Nauseum, and even to a lesser extent, Burn. Also, a T2 wrath against Affinity can essentially lock up the game if you can deal with a Plating or creature-land.
I can say from experience that Kessig is great in non-blood moon lists, the utility and raw power it brings is enough to overcome the occasional rare drawback of being a colorless land. A singleton is usually what people work with and it's not often the card screws you over.
It hurts me to double post, but I can't stand to see this thread languishing at the bottom. I wanted to post the list of the Top 8 decks from the SCG Columbus event and discuss our position in the meta.
2 UWR Control
1 GDS
1 Storm
1 Humans
1 GW Company
1 Skred Red
1 Kiki Twin
What I notice:
- 5 decks playing Blue. Logic Knot is en vogue right now with the UWR decks playing 3 copies each. Going forward, I'm playing to beat Logic Knot against non-Storm Blue decks. This means going hard after Blue sources with Mage and Beast, as well as preemptively using Faerie Macabre wen trying to resolve
a Living End. Also, it makes rushing a Living End on turn 2-3 a real option.
- Most of the creatures have Flash, pseudo-Flash or Haste. Demonic Dread is harder to resolve on opponents creatures, meaning I can't see going below 3 Beast Within to enable them.
- Almost no GY hate. Aside from the Skred deck maindecking 4 Relics, the only hate pieces at all are in the GW and Humans decks. Obviously, Blue decks have counterspells which can be tough to fight through, but not a single RIP in the Top 8, and only a few cards that interact with the yard at all is welcome news.
- Blood Moon is still good. Two of the top 8 decks are Blood Moon decks. And the majority of the other top 8 decks are vulnerable to it. I'm considering a 3rd in my board.
- Combo decks basically shut out. Their is a lot of fair Magic in this top 8, with no TitanShift, Tron or Dredge. This makes me think the meta game may shift back to Jund/Junk decks that can be better at being fair than the decks in this top 8. Which oils obviously be very good for us.
Do you suspect that the results from Columbus will result in any last-minute changes to your deck, Ken? I'm talking besides the potential 3rd Blood Moon you mentioned above.
I never saw any reply notification in my email or I would’ve been on it!
Take Columbus with a grain of salt, it’s home to a thriving magic community and many high level grinders are within a 3-hour drive — these players are all known for playing interactive decks that give them points for play skill.
Overall the meta becoming more fair isn’t something I’m super Agreed with, in the last GP fair decks were by and away the least represented.
Moving forward I’ll keep the 3rd blood moon and 3rd Beast Within, I might move up to a third Ricochet Trap over the 4th Ingot chewer though. Affinity has become less and less difficult the more comfortable with the MU ive gotten.
I agree with aggressively attacking Blue sources against Jeskai, I didn’t lose to either of the Jeskai opponents I faced at Columbus and honestly I feel comfortable in the MU.
EOT Beast Within an untapped Land will usually draw a counter spell, untap and Cascade because the Queller versions don’t play a Wrath in the MB, the non-Queller version you can just start hardcasting your guys and gun for the long game.
Against my 4th round Jeskai opponent, on the draw, he shocked, cast serum, double bottom, so t1 I used SSG x2 to put a t1 Fulminator in and nuke his land. He topdecked one, his next turn he missed, EOT I double cycled and untapped, cascaded and eliminated his only land with two horror in play. I feel it’s often very right to eliminate their mana ASAP because they rely on expensive, powerful spells to get back in the game.
Another thing worth noting, you might attack their W sources postboard because they need WW for all of the wraths they might play. I’ve kept an opponent on no white and beat down with a Street Wraith before.
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Do you suspect that the results from Columbus will result in any last-minute changes to your deck, Ken? I'm talking besides the potential 3rd Blood Moon you mentioned above.
Archfiends feel a bit loose. I'm at the point of losing them both for Faerie Macabre to get the full set in the maindeck, and replace the sideboard Faerie with the 3rd Blood Moon. I really don't think the demon is anything more than win more. Beyond that, I feel really comfortable with the list. If I'm being really analytical, I may drop one Dread for the 4th Fulminator.
He is bit too slow I think, Ingot Chewer and Beast Within are better.
Only thing he is better than Beast Within is he won't give your opponent a 3/3 beast, and that 3/3 beast can give your opponent a fast clock to beat you down.
Like when you have that card on the battlefield and you expect to kill your opponent Rest in Peace in the next turn but you have 0 mana left, your opponent use a removal on that card, then you are doomed.
I think after the most recent SCG I’ll always keep at least one Archfiend in the MB, max of two; he was singlehandedly responsible for beating Affinity, no other card would’ve done the trick.
His flying 5/4 body was also relevant to clock Eldrazi Tron, even though I ended up losing the Match G1 was heavily my favor because I made his smashers tiny and clocked in the air.
Agreed, 4th Dread doesn’t feel relevant right now, I see next to zero swarm MUs beyond affinity. Might play more Faerie, might go up to 4th interactive spell. Depends what meta is next time I pick Living End
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Giving your opponent a beast is not a downside in this deck...
I like brontodon, but I think he fits more in a deck that runs pridemage or simialar than LE. I would never run him over the first 4 ingot chewers, and even if you need more artifact removal at that point krosan grip or wear//tear may he better options.
Krosan Grip having split second has been relevant for me in enough matches that I always try to pack one. Eldrazi Tron and UWx decks are usually on Relic, and they get really greedy with them (waiting until you have Living End on the Stack).
It’s also great to remove hate against decks with counter spells.
It also hits Ravager and doesn’t let them sacrifice everything to it, which has come up exactly one time and it was a blowout.
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Giving your opponent a beast is not a downside in this deck...
I like brontodon, but I think he fits more in a deck that runs pridemage or simialar than LE. I would never run him over the first 4 ingot chewers, and even if you need more artifact removal at that point krosan grip or wear//tear may he better options.
I like your list and completely agree with your current assessment of the meta. My lgs likes to shift rapidly and I'm seeing a few burn, storm, lantern, Tron, merfolk, affinity, control varients, and jund.
What do you consider your good, even, or bad matchups? I have a hard time with storm, what exactly are you targeting with beast within and faerie macabre? Do you have any experience/tips vs lantern?
Even: Decks with a card MB that hoses us (Meddling Mage, chalice of the void, scavenging ooze, et al)
Bad: Affinity, storm, scapeshift, true control decks (Jeskai tempo is laughably easy if you play tight)
Re: Storm
Depends on state and play/draw. If I’m on the play and I can t2 destroy a land, I’ll prioritize the mana denial play. On the draw, I do my best to only cascade off of Outburst and only when I have lethal in 2 attacks. I prioritize leaving Beast Within up on their turn over anything else honestly. They get their dude in play, ritual, ritual, Beast Within. With Faerie, I put Pif in GY and give them the rituals to try and “get em” with Faerie Macabre. You won’t have priority until they go to cast a different spell, so a smart one will flash Pif back first. If they don’t, exile it and any grapeshots they have. Barring grapeshots, hit remands. Missing those, the options in order of highest to lowest priority to exile: manamorphose, then gifts, then desperate ritual, then pyretic ritual.
Re: Lantern
The MU is very dependent on them having an early Bridge and it sticking around. I blaze through turns 1-3, once I’ve cascaded I stop cycling and start saving the draws for getting a Beast Within off the top. You can also fetch to hide it if you don’t have cyclers yet, but that’s the worst case scenario because there’s no guarantee you’ll find it again before they find a second bridge.
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RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
Tl;dr — 4-3 drop, I was sick as a dog and tried to power through it with an assortment of Claritin, DayQuil, acetaminophen, and caffeine but to no avail. I felt blackout drunk by round 4 lol. Made a lot of play mistakes that I (mostly) immediately recognized, some that I didn’t recognize until much later when I wasn’t dying from mucus overload + fever.
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Two and a half weeks away from my own SCG tourney, here is what I'm currently on:
4x Street Wraith
4x Desert Ceradon
4x Horror of the Broken Lands
4x Monstrous Carabid
4x Simian Spirit Guide
3x Fulminator Mage
2x Archfiend of Ifnir
2x Faerie Macabre
Spells - 15
4x Demonic Dread
4x Violent Outburst
3x Living End
3x Beast Within
1x Kolaghan's Command
4x Verdant Catacombs
4x Blackcleave Cliffs
2x Grove of the Burnwillows
2x Swamp
1x Forest
1x Blooming Marsh
1x Blood Crypt
1x Overgrown Tomb
1x Stomping Ground
1x Kessig Wolf Run
3x Ingot Chewer
3x Leyline of Sanctity
2x Blood Moon
2x Ricohet Trap
2x Shriekmaw
1x Faerie Macabre
1x Krosan Grip
1x Slaughter Games
Major changes for me are moving the Shriekmaw to the board, shaving a Fulminator, bringing back 2 Archfiend, and making concessions to the U meta with my sideboard. Also, I finally cut the 19th land for a 4 SSG, because, as others have noted, it's how you beat opposing combo decks. You simply have to get on the board vs Valakut, Ad Nauseum, and even to a lesser extent, Burn. Also, a T2 wrath against Affinity can essentially lock up the game if you can deal with a Plating or creature-land.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
@Robo_Memer on Twitter, Twitch, Reddit, and YouTube
Feel free to PM me about Affinity decks in any format!
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
2 UWR Control
1 GDS
1 Storm
1 Humans
1 GW Company
1 Skred Red
1 Kiki Twin
What I notice:
- 5 decks playing Blue. Logic Knot is en vogue right now with the UWR decks playing 3 copies each. Going forward, I'm playing to beat Logic Knot against non-Storm Blue decks. This means going hard after Blue sources with Mage and Beast, as well as preemptively using Faerie Macabre wen trying to resolve
a Living End. Also, it makes rushing a Living End on turn 2-3 a real option.
- Most of the creatures have Flash, pseudo-Flash or Haste. Demonic Dread is harder to resolve on opponents creatures, meaning I can't see going below 3 Beast Within to enable them.
- Almost no GY hate. Aside from the Skred deck maindecking 4 Relics, the only hate pieces at all are in the GW and Humans decks. Obviously, Blue decks have counterspells which can be tough to fight through, but not a single RIP in the Top 8, and only a few cards that interact with the yard at all is welcome news.
- Blood Moon is still good. Two of the top 8 decks are Blood Moon decks. And the majority of the other top 8 decks are vulnerable to it. I'm considering a 3rd in my board.
- Combo decks basically shut out. Their is a lot of fair Magic in this top 8, with no TitanShift, Tron or Dredge. This makes me think the meta game may shift back to Jund/Junk decks that can be better at being fair than the decks in this top 8. Which oils obviously be very good for us.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
Take Columbus with a grain of salt, it’s home to a thriving magic community and many high level grinders are within a 3-hour drive — these players are all known for playing interactive decks that give them points for play skill.
Overall the meta becoming more fair isn’t something I’m super Agreed with, in the last GP fair decks were by and away the least represented.
Moving forward I’ll keep the 3rd blood moon and 3rd Beast Within, I might move up to a third Ricochet Trap over the 4th Ingot chewer though. Affinity has become less and less difficult the more comfortable with the MU ive gotten.
I agree with aggressively attacking Blue sources against Jeskai, I didn’t lose to either of the Jeskai opponents I faced at Columbus and honestly I feel comfortable in the MU.
EOT Beast Within an untapped Land will usually draw a counter spell, untap and Cascade because the Queller versions don’t play a Wrath in the MB, the non-Queller version you can just start hardcasting your guys and gun for the long game.
Against my 4th round Jeskai opponent, on the draw, he shocked, cast serum, double bottom, so t1 I used SSG x2 to put a t1 Fulminator in and nuke his land. He topdecked one, his next turn he missed, EOT I double cycled and untapped, cascaded and eliminated his only land with two horror in play. I feel it’s often very right to eliminate their mana ASAP because they rely on expensive, powerful spells to get back in the game.
Another thing worth noting, you might attack their W sources postboard because they need WW for all of the wraths they might play. I’ve kept an opponent on no white and beat down with a Street Wraith before.
@Robo_Memer on Twitter, Twitch, Reddit, and YouTube
Feel free to PM me about Affinity decks in any format!
Archfiends feel a bit loose. I'm at the point of losing them both for Faerie Macabre to get the full set in the maindeck, and replace the sideboard Faerie with the 3rd Blood Moon. I really don't think the demon is anything more than win more. Beyond that, I feel really comfortable with the list. If I'm being really analytical, I may drop one Dread for the 4th Fulminator.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
He is bit too slow I think, Ingot Chewer and Beast Within are better.
Only thing he is better than Beast Within is he won't give your opponent a 3/3 beast, and that 3/3 beast can give your opponent a fast clock to beat you down.
Like when you have that card on the battlefield and you expect to kill your opponent Rest in Peace in the next turn but you have 0 mana left, your opponent use a removal on that card, then you are doomed.
EDH: Xenagos, God of Revels.
His flying 5/4 body was also relevant to clock Eldrazi Tron, even though I ended up losing the Match G1 was heavily my favor because I made his smashers tiny and clocked in the air.
Agreed, 4th Dread doesn’t feel relevant right now, I see next to zero swarm MUs beyond affinity. Might play more Faerie, might go up to 4th interactive spell. Depends what meta is next time I pick Living End
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I like brontodon, but I think he fits more in a deck that runs pridemage or simialar than LE. I would never run him over the first 4 ingot chewers, and even if you need more artifact removal at that point krosan grip or wear//tear may he better options.
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Comedy gaming podcast. Listening to it makes you cool.
It’s also great to remove hate against decks with counter spells.
It also hits Ravager and doesn’t let them sacrifice everything to it, which has come up exactly one time and it was a blowout.
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At that point, just run Shatterstorm.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU