How do we board vs Sun and Moon? srs Q. My MD is pretty stock, 1x Last Hope 3x LOTV, 3x IOK 3x TS 1x Brutality 1x Maelstrom 2x Decay
My board is:
2x Collective Brutality
2x Kambal
1x Thrun
1x Gideon AOZ
1x Damnation
1x Flaying Tendrils
2x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Golgari Charm
3x Stony Silence
1x Maelstrom Pulse
My board-ins were Pulse, Golgari Charm, Gideon, Thrun, and 2 Brutality. Not sure if I should have boarded in Kambal? My cuts were 3x Fatal Push, 2x Scavenging Ooze, 1x Siege Rhino.
My reasoning is: walkers are good to try and run them out of resources/present a flow of threat, my creatures are pretty good but scooze is anemic and Rhino is just a generic big dude + I'm boarding in a pair of 4 drops, I keep in paths to deal with the plethora of Gideons. Brutality is to snipe extra wraths/angers out of the board, decays stay to deal with oring/rip/journey/blood moon, golgari charm is a further assistant to decay while also sometimes helping with Day of Judgments and Angers.
Any thoughts? This matchup seems unwinnable to me.
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I live for fair Magic.
Into the maindeck Explosives - I think thats a good choice right now. Not sure about Gideon's Intervention in the board. Seems slow - but I think the idea is that Valakut decks have few to no ways to interact with it. Magus of the Tabernacle is a funny one.
EDIT: Just noticed, No Abrupt Decay in the 75. BOLD.
I like Engineered Explosives main-deck in Junk or Jund. It's a decent card in any side-board but with three colors it's very solid and certainly worth considering for the main-deck.
Abzan/Jund/GB Rock decks will almost certainly be around in modern for a while. The GBx strategy doesn't appear to be going anywhere as of right now.
Agreed, but they are perhaps a little less popular than they have been at times. While this may well change, right now, some bad match-up-decks seem to be quite popular.
New cards are always coming out and bans and un-bans can always change things. Personally, I'm not sure GBx was ever a good investment. It's a great deal of money to invest in a hobby but one must admit it doesn't compare to collecting Corvettes.
All that said, I still roll with the Rock once in a while and I may at some point try Junk or Jund again. I've done it all before with some success but I've also had equal or greater success with much cheaper decks.
I think it's worth the investment if, Like me, you were able to test the deck prior to purchase and enjoyed playing it. I' a blue control player but I've had wildly more success with Abzan than any Uxx decks. I enjoyplaying Abzan as a control deck and love being able smack someone with a big vanilla 2 mana doofus (Tarmogoyf). There's something so rewarding about it. Plus, Grim Flayer is a helluva card.
However, the question was posed before somewhere and I can't remember where. Does modern need Jund or does Jund need modern. I'm afraid to say it but the latter is the answer. Modern at any point could move past GBx decks without so much as a second thought to it. Only one time has Jund been the "best Deck" in modern and that's when we had Deathrite Shaman. This was before my time in the format so I never got to experience the power of it. What that tells me though, some bans and unbans could wildly reshape the format.
So if you like the deck, buy in. If you don't, don't bother. There are far cheaper decks that could offer a lot more success in the format.
Hey guys, I'm a fairly new GBx player gearing up for a 1k in a couple days and I'd like some sideboarding tips, both on what to put in my SB but also some common matchups and how to board for them. I have several years of experience in the format so I know a decent amount but some of the finer things I'm sure that I'm missing might win me an extra game or two and I'd greatly appreciate any help at all! I have a fairly stock MB with the following SB:
Heya guys, I'm working my way towards being an abzan modern player. My goal is rather than just building a deck and playing that, to have playsets of most relevant cards so I can freely switch up my play to keep things fresh, try various different flavours of the deck. To me that's what is appealing about Junk colours, they seem to be able to be played in loads of different ways.
So pursuant to that- I've just completed my playsets of all the core cards noted in the primer (other than liliana, currently have a 2/2 split of veil and hope). Care to share what you think are some of the most important cards these days to keep a set of for tweaks and/or brewing? Personal favourites and interesting tech more than the all-time stars since I'm getting those as a matter of course.
Any tips for a newbie on approaching a local meta and adjusting to it with tweaks or style shifts within the colours?
some things to note that i found out today playing the deck:
- I love the delve creatures atm in fatal push heavy meta,
- All creatures are 4+ power, so stubborn denial becomes active really fast,
- Grisly salvage acts as a semi-creature tutor + fills the graveyard REALLY fast for delve fatties + pick and choose your graveyard cards, making Flayer 4/4 really fast,
- Grisly salvage is amazing at grindy games,
- Grapple with the past is amazing for grindy matches too. Both are instants. really sweet EOT cast, gets any creature from the GY back,
- i have never hit so many flayer triggers playing abzan as i did today with this list. mostly due to: "attack with 2/2 flayer", opponent blocks, reponse, grisly salvage, set up delirium, trample over + kill creature...?? profit!",
- loved it how the deck grinded,
- loved every single opening hand with grisly salvage. I think im in love with that card from today on,
- sideboard plan is to switch both blue lands+stubborn denials for white lands+souls against control decks, affinity and BGx decks,
- IMO the deck has improved matchup against burn+storm, due to souls not clogging the hand and stubborn denials main.
- necropolis fiend is easier to cast than you might think and its freeking amazing. it blocked, tapped and killed so many lingering souls today..
- i think the deck is also better against any tron variants due to sideboard countermagic.
- counterspelling stuff feels amazing, especially when they dont know what you are playing. and you fetch for a blue land and stub something.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the deck + any improvement. For example, SB seems a bit clogged due to white sideboard + lands. But lingering souls...
plus ~12 removal/disruption between FP/PTE/AD/TS/IoK. ~22 lands
Bear in mind I'm a total rookie, I've followed magic for a long time but it's my first time trying to dig into a competitive format at a competitive level. The above card selections are based around supporting quickly filling the yard and pushing tempo. I've heard advice that in general playing an aggressive strategy is a good way to start, and then ease back on the throttle as you figure out the format and your meta.
some things to note that i found out today playing the deck:
- I love the delve creatures atm in fatal push heavy meta,
- All creatures are 4+ power, so stubborn denial becomes active really fast,
- Grisly salvage acts as a semi-creature tutor + fills the graveyard REALLY fast for delve fatties + pick and choose your graveyard cards, making Flayer 4/4 really fast,
- Grisly salvage is amazing at grindy games,
- Grapple with the past is amazing for grindy matches too. Both are instants. really sweet EOT cast, gets any creature from the GY back,
- i have never hit so many flayer triggers playing abzan as i did today with this list. mostly due to: "attack with 2/2 flayer", opponent blocks, reponse, grisly salvage, set up delirium, trample over + kill creature...?? profit!",
- loved it how the deck grinded,
- loved every single opening hand with grisly salvage. I think im in love with that card from today on,
- sideboard plan is to switch both blue lands+stubborn denials for white lands+souls against control decks, affinity and BGx decks,
- IMO the deck has improved matchup against burn+storm, due to souls not clogging the hand and stubborn denials main.
- necropolis fiend is easier to cast than you might think and its freeking amazing. it blocked, tapped and killed so many lingering souls today..
- i think the deck is also better against any tron variants due to sideboard countermagic.
- counterspelling stuff feels amazing, especially when they dont know what you are playing. and you fetch for a blue land and stub something.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the deck + any improvement. For example, SB seems a bit clogged due to white sideboard + lands. But lingering souls...
That Necro Fiend though! I forgot that was a card. This list is pretty dope. I might throw this together for FNM later this week and test it out. this is the kind of list that puts butterflies in my tummy and makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.
Sweet man I thought about snapcasters too, but adding blue cards to the main deck, removes the ability to change colours after sideboarding and bring in lingering souls. Plus snapcasters maybe dont go together with liliana as well, since u wanna keep snap in hand but also +1 liliana most of the time.. I love the Sultai version so far, and im gonna continue to test it.
The same thing you said about Snapcaster and Liliana can be said for counter magic and Liliana. I'm just going to take your base list, modify it a little for myself, and test it.
I'm also not a huge fan of the sideboard transformation. I think it eats up too much of your sideboard without providing enough help to the main deck in some bad match ups. I have a list together that I'm going to try. Maybe tonight if I can throw it together in time. I will post list and results for you after I get a chance to play with it though.
Tonight was..... Interesting with the deck as my first go around with it. I went 4-0. on the Draw all 4 rounds, rolled 4's every time, and 2-0'd every opponent. The 2-0 is not indicative to how well the deck is built though. I feel like I got lucky in a couple of match ups... or rather my opponents seem to have gotten unlucky and I was on the receiving end of it.
Round 1 - Goblins 2-0:
Game 1 - He started quick but couldn't deal with multiple threats coming at him. Grim Flayer and Tarmogoyf were really good this game.
Game 2 - I don't really recall anything memorable about this game other than I did the exact same thing as game one except both Liliana's were great here.
Round 2 - Burn 2-0:(I don't feel like this is a good match up for me)
Game 1 - He got me to a low life total but he ended up drawing way too many lands and not enough spells.
Game 2 - I caught a few breaks with spells matching up well against him. Cleaned his hand out early, played some big threats, and mowed him down. This was another game where he drew a lot of lands but I also had an active Liliana of the Veil and had Stubborn Denial in hand with a Snapcaster Mage at the ready. I didn't think he was going to win this one after I stabilized.
Round 3 - Bant Company 2-0:
Game 1 - I killed his creatures, he was stuck on 2 mana for a while, I delved away most of my graveyard and immediately got punished with a path to exile on the Gurmag Angler and was left with a 2/2 Grim Flayer on board. He cast a Collected Company and whiffed allowing me to fatal push his only threat (a blank Spell Queller) and I got to run him over from there.
Game 2 - He ended up removing the combo for this game. He played an early Geist of Saint Traft and on turn 4 I cast Damnation into 4 open mana with my fingers crossed hoping he didn't have a Spell Queller or Collected Company. I was able to slam down a couple of beaters over the next couple of turns and swing through for the win. Double 5/6 Goyfs while he was at 5 did wonders against his Geist he played that turn.
Round 4 - Jund 2-0:
This match up felt SO EZPZ Lemon Squeezy
Game 1 - We trade Resources for the first turns but because of Grapple with the Past, I was able to gain card advantage on him and he couldn't deal with as many threats as I could produce.
Game 2 - He chooses to be on the draw as we have both sided out our hand disruption spells for more board impactful threats. Again I punish him with my Grapples and card advantage. On turn 4 I play a Gurmag Angler and Grim Flayer with 1 open blue source and a Liliana of the Veil on 2 counters. He cast Kolaghan's Command at EOT to deal 2 damage to Liliana and return a Scavenging Ooze and it gets met with a Stubborn Denial. Stopping the 2 for 1 won me this game.
All in all, I thought the deck felt great. There are some changes that need to be made to the deck but for the most part, I was happy with it.
Moving Forward:
I feel like this deck is maybe a little susceptible to graveyard hate and it may be worth while looking into some way to stop something like Rest in Peace (aside from just Abrupt Decay, Stopping Nihil Spellbomb/Relic of Progenitus, and maybe some other way to eliminate Leyline of the Void.
Maybe leaving the Nature's Claim in the board is correct and maybe trying to find a spot for some sort of "Counter target activated/Triggered ability" is a route to take. Though that seems like a pipe dream and living in magic Christmas land in order to have that up at the exact same time they have those abilities going off.
Conclusion:
This deck was AWESOME to play! I had a lot of fun with it. I think this might be better than the other GBx Midrange decks but more testing would need to be done. The deck didn't feel clunky at all but, there was a sense that the 2 drop spot may be a little tight if you change the Though Scours to Grisly Salvages. Both Grapple with the Past and Grisly Salvage have an argument to be int he deck but I chose Grapple due to it's ability to recur old threats and not just dig for new ones.
Edit/: I also want to consider adding a The Scarab God to the Sideboard. He is extremely grindy and seems Like he could be insanely useful in a lot of match ups. Hes also a HUGE body too.
Collective Brutality gains you about 7-8 life if you cast it and escalate it twice. Burn is an easier matchup for Abzan than Jund but its still difficult. It's not a free win but its not as much of a struggle. Just have to time your spells right.
I have been testing some games. What are your strategies against anti-GY cards like relic and rest in peace? I have been waiting with decay and pulse to blow them up then restocking the GY for tarmos. Also blood moon. Here if i see mainboard red and the deck is known to play moon main i fetch basics. Some turns i have to hold up mana so i can decay. Makes some turns slightly awkward to play because I am not progressing my board.
I have been testing some games. What are your strategies against anti-GY cards like relic and rest in peace? I have been waiting with decay and pulse to blow them up then restocking the GY for tarmos. Also blood moon. Here if i see mainboard red and the deck is known to play moon main i fetch basics. Some turns i have to hold up mana so i can decay. Makes some turns slightly awkward to play because I am not progressing my board.
That's all you can do against rip and relic. You can also play creatures like rhino and tracker that don't rely on the yard to sort of circumvent the hate. I don't really think blood moon is a big concern, it depends on how many fetches you play. I just recently played against a mono red prison deck that turn 2ed blood moon in 2 games and still won the match. I don't think you can just hold up decays with no board presence. It's like the splinter twin deck back in the day, they want you to contort your play, so that they get time to find their best end game. Just play a goyf and go to town, hell we have flayer, which should be able to find your basics if you happen to not have fetched any out, but you shouldn't be keeping hands that don't have at least one fetch against a known blood moon deck.
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If MTG is a part of your life, the formats are like relationships:
Standard/Block = The on-again, off-again holiday fling
Modern/Vintage/Legacy = Stable, homely. A ***** after absence/misreading
Limited/Sealed = Heart breaking free spirit
Commander/Cube = Agreeable, needy and expensive
Pauper/Peasant = Sweet, kind, practical, but shy and boring
About a couple of months ago started practicing with junk, due to gp Santa Clara used to play Kiki chord but I felt that I needed to play a tier deck, and got my first 5-0 in a competitive list with the list below, I am on the dark confidant side, although the next iteration of the list will be -1 Nihil Spellbomb, -1 Lingering Souls, +2 Grim Flayer. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions of things to try or improve, I struggle against u/w control lists, but probably misplaying the match up.
My board is:
2x Collective Brutality
2x Kambal
1x Thrun
1x Gideon AOZ
1x Damnation
1x Flaying Tendrils
2x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Golgari Charm
3x Stony Silence
1x Maelstrom Pulse
My board-ins were Pulse, Golgari Charm, Gideon, Thrun, and 2 Brutality. Not sure if I should have boarded in Kambal? My cuts were 3x Fatal Push, 2x Scavenging Ooze, 1x Siege Rhino.
My reasoning is: walkers are good to try and run them out of resources/present a flow of threat, my creatures are pretty good but scooze is anemic and Rhino is just a generic big dude + I'm boarding in a pair of 4 drops, I keep in paths to deal with the plethora of Gideons. Brutality is to snipe extra wraths/angers out of the board, decays stay to deal with oring/rip/journey/blood moon, golgari charm is a further assistant to decay while also sometimes helping with Day of Judgments and Angers.
Any thoughts? This matchup seems unwinnable to me.
I live for fair Magic.
Legacy: D&T/Lands
Modern: BGx
1 Engineered Explosives
4 Mishra's Bauble
Creatures
4 Grim Flayer
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Instants
4 Fatal Push
3 Path to Exile
Planeswalkers
4 Liliana of the Veil
Sorceries
1 Collective Brutality
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Lingering Souls
3 Thoughtseize
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Swamp
3 Blooming Marsh
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Godless Shrine
4 Marsh Flats
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Temple Garden
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Fulminator Mage
1 Magus of the Tabernacle
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Gideon's Intervention
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Kataki, War's Wage
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Collective Brutality
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Thoughtseize
Into the maindeck Explosives - I think thats a good choice right now. Not sure about Gideon's Intervention in the board. Seems slow - but I think the idea is that Valakut decks have few to no ways to interact with it. Magus of the Tabernacle is a funny one.
EDIT: Just noticed, No Abrupt Decay in the 75. BOLD.
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
Agreed, but they are perhaps a little less popular than they have been at times. While this may well change, right now, some bad match-up-decks seem to be quite popular.
New cards are always coming out and bans and un-bans can always change things. Personally, I'm not sure GBx was ever a good investment. It's a great deal of money to invest in a hobby but one must admit it doesn't compare to collecting Corvettes.
All that said, I still roll with the Rock once in a while and I may at some point try Junk or Jund again. I've done it all before with some success but I've also had equal or greater success with much cheaper decks.
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
I think it's worth the investment if, Like me, you were able to test the deck prior to purchase and enjoyed playing it. I' a blue control player but I've had wildly more success with Abzan than any Uxx decks. I enjoyplaying Abzan as a control deck and love being able smack someone with a big vanilla 2 mana doofus (Tarmogoyf). There's something so rewarding about it. Plus, Grim Flayer is a helluva card.
However, the question was posed before somewhere and I can't remember where. Does modern need Jund or does Jund need modern. I'm afraid to say it but the latter is the answer. Modern at any point could move past GBx decks without so much as a second thought to it. Only one time has Jund been the "best Deck" in modern and that's when we had Deathrite Shaman. This was before my time in the format so I never got to experience the power of it. What that tells me though, some bans and unbans could wildly reshape the format.
So if you like the deck, buy in. If you don't, don't bother. There are far cheaper decks that could offer a lot more success in the format.
G/X Tron says hi!
1 Thoughtseize
1 Celestial purge
2 Stony silence
2 Collective brutality
2 flaying tendrils
2 fulminator mage
1 Gideon, ally of zendikar
1 damnation
Modern: UW, Jeskai, Grixis, Blue moon, Esper, Sultai, UB, UWish
Legacy: Miracles
So pursuant to that- I've just completed my playsets of all the core cards noted in the primer (other than liliana, currently have a 2/2 split of veil and hope). Care to share what you think are some of the most important cards these days to keep a set of for tweaks and/or brewing? Personal favourites and interesting tech more than the all-time stars since I'm getting those as a matter of course.
Any tips for a newbie on approaching a local meta and adjusting to it with tweaks or style shifts within the colours?
i played against:
Abzan midrange: 1-1 draw
Jeskai control: 2-0
UW control: 1-2
Naya burn: 2-1
1 treetop village
1 hissing quagmire
1 twilight mire
1 breeding pool
1 watery grave
2 overgrown tomb
2 polluted delta
1 windswept heath
1 marsh flats
4 verdant catacombs
4 blooming marsh
2 swamp
1 forest
REMOVAL/COUNTER
4 fatal push
2 abrupt decay
1 maelstrom pulse
3 stubborn denial
3 inquisition of kozilek
3 thoughtseize
PLANESWALKER
3 liliana of the veil
1 liliana the last hope
CREATURES
4 tarmogoyf
4 grim flayer
2 gurmag angler
1 tasigur, the golden fang
1 necropolis fiend
GRAVEYARD SHENANIGANS
4 grisly salvage
2 grapple with the past
3 lingering souls
1 temple garden
1 godless shrine
1 ceremonious rejection
2 disdainful stroke
2 nihil spellbomb
1 damnation
2 collective brutality
2 stony silence
some things to note that i found out today playing the deck:
- I love the delve creatures atm in fatal push heavy meta,
- All creatures are 4+ power, so stubborn denial becomes active really fast,
- Grisly salvage acts as a semi-creature tutor + fills the graveyard REALLY fast for delve fatties + pick and choose your graveyard cards, making Flayer 4/4 really fast,
- Grisly salvage is amazing at grindy games,
- Grapple with the past is amazing for grindy matches too. Both are instants. really sweet EOT cast, gets any creature from the GY back,
- i have never hit so many flayer triggers playing abzan as i did today with this list. mostly due to: "attack with 2/2 flayer", opponent blocks, reponse, grisly salvage, set up delirium, trample over + kill creature...?? profit!",
- loved it how the deck grinded,
- loved every single opening hand with grisly salvage. I think im in love with that card from today on,
- sideboard plan is to switch both blue lands+stubborn denials for white lands+souls against control decks, affinity and BGx decks,
- IMO the deck has improved matchup against burn+storm, due to souls not clogging the hand and stubborn denials main.
- necropolis fiend is easier to cast than you might think and its freeking amazing. it blocked, tapped and killed so many lingering souls today..
- i think the deck is also better against any tron variants due to sideboard countermagic.
- counterspelling stuff feels amazing, especially when they dont know what you are playing. and you fetch for a blue land and stub something.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the deck + any improvement. For example, SB seems a bit clogged due to white sideboard + lands. But lingering souls...
Cards to be considered:
murderous cut
mishra's bauble
traverse the ulvenwald
thought scour
manabase improvements, like +1 misty rainforest, +1 polluted delta maybe and go full sultai?
As of yet I haven't built one, I'm gently devouring this thread and trying to find up to date content on the matchup.
If I were to build something, I'd be inclined to probably try an aggressive Flayer-oriented list. Something like
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Grim Flayer
3 Dark Confidant
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Liliana, the last hope
Other
4 Lingering Souls
4 Mishra's bauble
2 Collective brutality
plus ~12 removal/disruption between FP/PTE/AD/TS/IoK. ~22 lands
Bear in mind I'm a total rookie, I've followed magic for a long time but it's my first time trying to dig into a competitive format at a competitive level. The above card selections are based around supporting quickly filling the yard and pushing tempo. I've heard advice that in general playing an aggressive strategy is a good way to start, and then ease back on the throttle as you figure out the format and your meta.
That Necro Fiend though! I forgot that was a card. This list is pretty dope. I might throw this together for FNM later this week and test it out. this is the kind of list that puts butterflies in my tummy and makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.
I might be in on the Grisly Salvage and Thought Scour deck. I may add a Snapcaster Mage or 2 in here somewhere though.
I'm also not a huge fan of the sideboard transformation. I think it eats up too much of your sideboard without providing enough help to the main deck in some bad match ups. I have a list together that I'm going to try. Maybe tonight if I can throw it together in time. I will post list and results for you after I get a chance to play with it though.
Tonight was..... Interesting with the deck as my first go around with it. I went 4-0. on the Draw all 4 rounds, rolled 4's every time, and 2-0'd every opponent. The 2-0 is not indicative to how well the deck is built though. I feel like I got lucky in a couple of match ups... or rather my opponents seem to have gotten unlucky and I was on the receiving end of it.
So any ways, here's the list that I ran tonight:
4 Grim Flayer
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Snapcaster Mage
1 Gurmag Angler
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
1 Necropolis Fiend
Planeswalkers:
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
Instat/Sorcery:
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
3 Fatal Push
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Maelstrom Pulse
3 Grapple with the Past
3 Thought Scour
3 Stubborn Denial
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Polluted Delta
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Watery Grave
1 Breeding Pool
2 Swamp
1 Island
1 Forest
2 Blooming Marsh
2 Darkslick Shores
1 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Dispel
1 Disdainful Stroke
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Damnation
3 Fulminator Mage
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Ceremonious Rejection
1 Thragtusk
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Nature's Claim
1 Pulse of Murasa
Round 1 - Goblins 2-0:
Game 1 - He started quick but couldn't deal with multiple threats coming at him. Grim Flayer and Tarmogoyf were really good this game.
Game 2 - I don't really recall anything memorable about this game other than I did the exact same thing as game one except both Liliana's were great here.
Round 2 - Burn 2-0: (I don't feel like this is a good match up for me)
Game 1 - He got me to a low life total but he ended up drawing way too many lands and not enough spells.
Game 2 - I caught a few breaks with spells matching up well against him. Cleaned his hand out early, played some big threats, and mowed him down. This was another game where he drew a lot of lands but I also had an active Liliana of the Veil and had Stubborn Denial in hand with a Snapcaster Mage at the ready. I didn't think he was going to win this one after I stabilized.
Round 3 - Bant Company 2-0:
Game 1 - I killed his creatures, he was stuck on 2 mana for a while, I delved away most of my graveyard and immediately got punished with a path to exile on the Gurmag Angler and was left with a 2/2 Grim Flayer on board. He cast a Collected Company and whiffed allowing me to fatal push his only threat (a blank Spell Queller) and I got to run him over from there.
Game 2 - He ended up removing the combo for this game. He played an early Geist of Saint Traft and on turn 4 I cast Damnation into 4 open mana with my fingers crossed hoping he didn't have a Spell Queller or Collected Company. I was able to slam down a couple of beaters over the next couple of turns and swing through for the win. Double 5/6 Goyfs while he was at 5 did wonders against his Geist he played that turn.
Round 4 - Jund 2-0:
This match up felt SO EZPZ Lemon Squeezy
Game 1 - We trade Resources for the first turns but because of Grapple with the Past, I was able to gain card advantage on him and he couldn't deal with as many threats as I could produce.
Game 2 - He chooses to be on the draw as we have both sided out our hand disruption spells for more board impactful threats. Again I punish him with my Grapples and card advantage. On turn 4 I play a Gurmag Angler and Grim Flayer with 1 open blue source and a Liliana of the Veil on 2 counters. He cast Kolaghan's Command at EOT to deal 2 damage to Liliana and return a Scavenging Ooze and it gets met with a Stubborn Denial. Stopping the 2 for 1 won me this game.
All in all, I thought the deck felt great. There are some changes that need to be made to the deck but for the most part, I was happy with it.
Changes that I would make:
I was not a fan of the Necropolis Fiend. It was very underwhelming. I feel like this could've and should've just been a Tombstalker or another Gurmag Angler.
Dispel was very mediocre. I think this would get replaced with a Feed the Clan or a second Pulse of Murasa.
I also feel like I want to add a Flaying Tendrils to the board somewhere. Maybe remove the Nature's Claim.
Surgical Extraction was fine but I feel like that should also be a Nihil Spellbomb.
Moving Forward:
I feel like this deck is maybe a little susceptible to graveyard hate and it may be worth while looking into some way to stop something like Rest in Peace (aside from just Abrupt Decay, Stopping Nihil Spellbomb/Relic of Progenitus, and maybe some other way to eliminate Leyline of the Void.
Maybe leaving the Nature's Claim in the board is correct and maybe trying to find a spot for some sort of "Counter target activated/Triggered ability" is a route to take. Though that seems like a pipe dream and living in magic Christmas land in order to have that up at the exact same time they have those abilities going off.
Conclusion:
This deck was AWESOME to play! I had a lot of fun with it. I think this might be better than the other GBx Midrange decks but more testing would need to be done. The deck didn't feel clunky at all but, there was a sense that the 2 drop spot may be a little tight if you change the Though Scours to Grisly Salvages. Both Grapple with the Past and Grisly Salvage have an argument to be int he deck but I chose Grapple due to it's ability to recur old threats and not just dig for new ones.
Edit/: I also want to consider adding a The Scarab God to the Sideboard. He is extremely grindy and seems Like he could be insanely useful in a lot of match ups. Hes also a HUGE body too.
That's all you can do against rip and relic. You can also play creatures like rhino and tracker that don't rely on the yard to sort of circumvent the hate. I don't really think blood moon is a big concern, it depends on how many fetches you play. I just recently played against a mono red prison deck that turn 2ed blood moon in 2 games and still won the match. I don't think you can just hold up decays with no board presence. It's like the splinter twin deck back in the day, they want you to contort your play, so that they get time to find their best end game. Just play a goyf and go to town, hell we have flayer, which should be able to find your basics if you happen to not have fetched any out, but you shouldn't be keeping hands that don't have at least one fetch against a known blood moon deck.
Standard/Block = The on-again, off-again holiday fling
Modern/Vintage/Legacy = Stable, homely. A ***** after absence/misreading
Limited/Sealed = Heart breaking free spirit
Commander/Cube = Agreeable, needy and expensive
Pauper/Peasant = Sweet, kind, practical, but shy and boring
About a couple of months ago started practicing with junk, due to gp Santa Clara used to play Kiki chord but I felt that I needed to play a tier deck, and got my first 5-0 in a competitive list with the list below, I am on the dark confidant side, although the next iteration of the list will be -1 Nihil Spellbomb, -1 Lingering Souls, +2 Grim Flayer. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions of things to try or improve, I struggle against u/w control lists, but probably misplaying the match up.
4 Dark confidant
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Siege Rhino
Planeswalkers:
3 Liliana of the Veil
1 Liliana, the last hope
Artifacts:
1 Nihil Spellbomb
Spells:
3 Fatal Push
3 Path to exile
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Collective Brutality
1 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Lingering Souls
4 Blooming Marsh
1 Forest
1 Godless Shrine
3 Marsh Flats
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Plains
2 Shambling Vent
1 Stirring Wildwood
2 Swamp
1 Temple Garden
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Windswept Heath
1 Collective Brutality
2 Flaying Tendrils
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Grafdigger's Cage
3 Stony Silence
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1 Damnation
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Feed the Clan
2 Fulminator Mage