I've taken 3 Khalni Heart Expeditions out for 2 omens and 1 chandra, torch of defiance. Taking the list to regionals this weekend. I think they're just a trash ramp spell and sucks if it gets destroyed or what not.
DEMS FIGHTIN WORDS
You can replace KHE with another ramp spell and the deck be just fine. KHE does a few things that a regular ramp spell (lets say farseek) can't, and lets you open up a few more plays:
- KHE+Titan: playing a KHE as your last play of turn 3 with the ability to cast a titan the following turn can let you get immediate value off your Titan trigger (with some set up, you can KHE for 12 or even 18 damage). You can make this exact same play with Omen.
- KHE+Omen+Scapeshift: Good 4 land kill that requires no ramp and can let you play with a tight hand. T2 KHE, T3 Omen, Turn 4 Scapeshift Grabbing 4 Valakuts. KHE will find mountains 5-6, enter the battlefield, and do 24 damage.
- KHE+Scapeshift: What the card actually does. Lets you get to 7 lands on turn 4 with only 2 ramp spells. Not relevant a lot of times, but can be your card advantage against controlling or 1 for 1 decks.
That said, the replacement you've suggested looks reasonable. I've played with 2 Omens for about a year. I've seen both of them in a game maybe twice ever, but either one of them often enough to be helpful.
I couldn't agree with nookularboy more. Expedition opens a ton of options.
Nothing feels better than attacking your landfall above the valakut trigger to get the third counter on expedition and push yourself to six mountains before the first valakut triggers resolve. Except using one expedition to get your 3rd counter on another under the same scenario...
I'll let you all know how it goes after regionals. I can toss my list up, its changed a bit from the deck tech I done, the link is a page back or something
I couldn't agree with nookularboy more. Expedition opens a ton of options.
Nothing feels better than attacking your landfall above the valakut trigger to get the third counter on expedition and push yourself to six mountains before the first valakut triggers resolve. Except using one expedition to get your 3rd counter on another under the same scenario...
Not sure what you mean by that. I assume you mean "stacking" instead of attacking. But what really confuses me is the part where you say you can use KHE to "get to 6 mountains before the first valakut trigger resolves". If you don't have 6 mountains when the lands hit the battlefield, valakut doesn't trigger. So if you play a land and sac KHE to get to 6 lands, only the KHE fetched lands trigger, the previous ones never triggered.
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Not sure what you mean by that. I assume you mean "stacking" instead of attacking. But what really confuses me is the part where you say you can use KHE to "get to 6 mountains before the first valakut trigger resolves". If you don't have 6 mountains when the lands hit the battlefield, valakut doesn't trigger. So if you play a land and sac KHE to get to 6 lands, only the KHE fetched lands trigger, the previous ones never triggered.
This is false. Valakut triggers whenever a mountain enters the battlefield regardless of how many mountains you already have, THEN it checks if you have 5 other mountains.
Not sure what you mean by that. I assume you mean "stacking" instead of attacking. But what really confuses me is the part where you say you can use KHE to "get to 6 mountains before the first valakut trigger resolves". If you don't have 6 mountains when the lands hit the battlefield, valakut doesn't trigger. So if you play a land and sac KHE to get to 6 lands, only the KHE fetched lands trigger, the previous ones never triggered.
This is false. Valakut triggers whenever a mountain enters the battlefield regardless of how many mountains you already have, THEN it checks if you have 5 other mountains.
Say that to the rules:
Quote from 603.4. »
A triggered ability may read “When/Whenever/At [trigger event], if [condition], [effect].” When the trigger event occurs, the ability checks whether the stated condition is true. The ability triggers only if it is; otherwise it does nothing. If the ability triggers, it checks the stated condition again as it resolves. If the condition isn’t true at that time, the ability is removed from the stack and does nothing. Note that this mirrors the check for legal targets. This rule is referred to as the “intervening ‘if’ clause” rule. (The word “if” has only its normal English meaning anywhere else in the text of a card; this rule only applies to an “if” that immediately follows a trigger condition.)
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Not sure what you mean by that. I assume you mean "stacking" instead of attacking. But what really confuses me is the part where you say you can use KHE to "get to 6 mountains before the first valakut trigger resolves". If you don't have 6 mountains when the lands hit the battlefield, valakut doesn't trigger. So if you play a land and sac KHE to get to 6 lands, only the KHE fetched lands trigger, the previous ones never triggered.
This is false. Valakut triggers whenever a mountain enters the battlefield regardless of how many mountains you already have, THEN it checks if you have 5 other mountains.
Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle’s triggered ability has an “intervening ‘if’ clause.” That means (1) the ability won’t trigger at all unless, at the time a Mountain enters the battlefield under your control, you control five or more Mountains other than that new one, and (2) the ability will do nothing if you control fewer than five Mountains other than that new one by the time it resolves.
Putriss, that is my understanding as well. The valakut triggers on mountain ETB but it doesn't check the mountain count until resolution. You just don't let the triggers resolve until you have increased your mountain count to 6+.
Darktutor, you're correct that my intention was to type stacking instead of attacking. (iPhone auto-correct)
*edit*
I'm an idiot and didn't read Putriss's ruling closely enough. I'm blaming it on the lack of coffee.
Putriss is correct here. Valakut has the "intervening if clause" which could be helpful to refresh.
So just to explain for anyone in the future who comes across these posts...
Valakut's trigger is an intervening if, which means that the trigger has to meet an additional clause in order to trigger and is written in the form "When/Whenever/At [trigger event], if [condition], [effect]". In our case, "Whenever a Mountain enters the battlefield under your control, if you control at least five other Mountains, you may have Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle deal 3 damage to target creature or player". If the additional if clause is not met, then the ability does not trigger. So lets say your turn 1 play is Valakut and your turn 2 play is Stomping Ground. When Stomping Ground enters the battlefield, is there a Valakut trigger that goes on the stack? No. If you were playing MTGO, the land would just come in normally with no effects. If that was your 7th land drop, with Valakut and 5 other mountains, then yes, a trigger goes on the stack because you've met both conditions.
The second half of the intervening if is that the conditions are checked again on resolution of the trigger. This is the part most of us are familiar with, knowing how land destruction can fizzle a lethal Scapeshift. Lets say I cast a 7 land Scapeshift and put 6 triggers on the stack (lets say grabbing 5 basic mountains and a stomping grounds), but my opponent has an active Tectonic Edge and destroys the Stomping Grounds that just came in. So each trigger goes to resolve. Basic Mountain 1 checks for 5 other mountains and only sees Basics Mountains 2-5, therefore the second clause of the intervening if is not met and the trigger does not resolve. Basic Mountains 2-5 go through a similar process. Then we get to the trigger caused by the Stomping Ground. This trigger goes to resolve and does see 5 other mountains (Basic Mountains 1-5), therefore the second condition is met and the trigger will resolve.
With this deck in particular, its important to remember that cards like Khalni Heart Expedition, Primeval Titan, Scapeshift, and Harrow put lands onto the battlefield at the same time. This is more evident with Scapeshift, but when the land enters and checks for the second clause of the intervening if, it will count its buddy/buddies that were brought in with it (since these are brought in at the same time due to resolution of the previous trigger/spell). So if you have Valakut + 4 Mountains with a Khalni Heart Expedition, grabbing two mountains from that KHE will net 6 damage since those mountains will be #5 and #6 and "see" each other.
I thought I'd respond to your post separately of the sort of mindset I take to the deck and has worked out for me. You have to remember, you're doing nothing before turn 4, no titan no lethal scapeshift. There are no combination of cards in the deck that let you do either of those earlier than turn 4.
Your opening hand can be pretty easy to evaluate. IN GENERAL, you would need:
It's straightfoward enough that its not hard to remember, but there are some caveats involving Search for Tomorrow & Khalni Heart Expedition (+2 Lands). Scapeshift hands can be more liberal on if you need to find an additional land or ramp spell, because you have the actual turn 4 to draw and cast it (since scapeshift is 4 mana and you need 7 lands) as opposed to a Titan turn which does not leave you with room to cast any extra on that turn.
For me, hands with just ramp spells and non-valakut lands typically go back. Depending on the opponent's deck, ramp spells, valakut, and lands is keepable. Using the above guidance, if your hand has a Titan/Scapeshift/Pact you can judge how keepable it is. I personally like to have payoff cards in my opening hand, since most of the deck is ramp spells and lands I'm more likely to just draw those. Hands with payoff cards and no ramp are mulligan'd depending on the opponents deck (anything fast, def mulligan'd. Anything slow, probably mulligan but think about it).
Hope that helps. SB looks fine. Hate the burn MU, its just naturally bad. If you're really worried about it, I would just throw in some Feed the Clans and call it a day. People were experimenting with Jadi Offshoot in the past in place of Baloth (4-of) with some success. Its good in no-other matchup, but if you play burn a lot could be worth it.
Thanks for the detailed explanation. I'm sure that I've only 'won'2 or 3 games of paper magic when I counted false valakut triggers. This includes play-testing wins. Thanks for saving me before I tried this during Comp REL.
Wow, that would be insane if Valakut does trigger on every Mountain entering the battlefield, regardless of amount, especially with KHE. Its definitely fine as it is. This explanation was really helpful for me as well, I did not yet know that Valakut also checks during resolution, now I understand the LD issue with 7 lands.
Yeah, I was thinking the way you described it would be akin to "damage on the stack" where you could play KHE then Scapeshift with 5 lands and then activate the KHE while everything is on the stack to have all the triggers count. I would have won a lot more games if that were the case.
I've gotten decent at explaining it, after doing it so many times. How Valakut works has to be the most mechanically non-intuitive thing in Modern, next to the full Ad Nauseam combo.
Wow, that would be insane if Valakut does trigger on every Mountain entering the battlefield, regardless of amount, especially with KHE. Its definitely fine as it is. This explanation was really helpful for me as well, I did not yet know that Valakut also checks during resolution, now I understand the LD issue with 7 lands.
There is one trigger that still resolves in that case, the same if there are multiple valakuts triggering for each mountain. When a mountain is destroyed with the abilities on the stack, the destroyed one will check and will see 5 other mountains so it will resolve, but the other 5 will be countered cause they will only see 4 other mountains. This is why Tectonic Edge works to stop the combo and Ghost Quarter doesn't (it actually adds more damage) unless the person run out of basics somehow.
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Wow, that would be insane if Valakut does trigger on every Mountain entering the battlefield, regardless of amount, especially with KHE. Its definitely fine as it is. This explanation was really helpful for me as well, I did not yet know that Valakut also checks during resolution, now I understand the LD issue with 7 lands.
There is one trigger that still resolves in that case, the same if there are multiple valakuts triggering for each mountain. When a mountain is destroyed with the abilities on the stack, the destroyed one will check and will see 5 other mountains so it will resolve, but the other 5 will be countered cause they will only see 4 other mountains. This is why Tectonic Edge works to stop the combo and Ghost Quarter doesn't (it actually adds more damage) unless the person run out of basics somehow.
So tec edge reduces the dmg from 18 to 3 basically (if activated on 7 lands)?
Wow, that would be insane if Valakut does trigger on every Mountain entering the battlefield, regardless of amount, especially with KHE. Its definitely fine as it is. This explanation was really helpful for me as well, I did not yet know that Valakut also checks during resolution, now I understand the LD issue with 7 lands.
There is one trigger that still resolves in that case, the same if there are multiple valakuts triggering for each mountain. When a mountain is destroyed with the abilities on the stack, the destroyed one will check and will see 5 other mountains so it will resolve, but the other 5 will be countered cause they will only see 4 other mountains. This is why Tectonic Edge works to stop the combo and Ghost Quarter doesn't (it actually adds more damage) unless the person run out of basics somehow.
So tec edge reduces the dmg from 18 to 3 basically (if activated on 7 lands)?
Yes:
Shift for 7: 1 Valakut 6 mountains. You destroy a mountain with Tec Edge (say a stomping ground). The battlefield is now Valakut + 5 mountains. Every trigger for the mountains on the field fizzle because they see 4 other mountains, the mountain you destroyed resolves and deals 3 damage because it sees 5 other mountains.
Shift for 8: 2 Valakut and 6 Mountains. You destroy a mountain with Tec Edge (say a stomping ground). The battlefield is now Valakut + 5 mountains. Every trigger for the mountains on the field fizzle because they see 4 other mountains, the mountain you destroyed resolves both its triggers and deals 3 damage each time because it sees 5 other mountains.
Shift for 8: 1 Valakut and 7 mountains = you're dead unless you have 2x Tec Edge.
There are other examples for more lands, but are very unreal to deal with (unless the person wants to lose and fetches 3 valakuts on a shift for 9 or 4 valakuts on a shift for 10).
EDIT: I know you play jund. So, if you ever play against Blue Scapeshift (either RUG or 4 Color), you should know they only play 2 basic mountains as maximum (4 color usually just 1) and 10 mountains in total, so if you have both GQ and TE or Fulminators, you can disrupt with TE and Fluminator early and force them to fetch the only basic in their deck, then GQ it. It's easier to disrupt them than us.
I've just about finished building this deck in paper and am trying to make some final decisions on my sideboard. My biggest problem is deciding between 2 engineered explosives or 2 chalices. My meta has a really diverse spread of decks but the most common decks are a lot of jund, some burn, and a couple of infect and affinity decks. Which one of those cards do you guys think would be the best against those decks?
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DEMS FIGHTIN WORDS
You can replace KHE with another ramp spell and the deck be just fine. KHE does a few things that a regular ramp spell (lets say farseek) can't, and lets you open up a few more plays:
- KHE+Titan: playing a KHE as your last play of turn 3 with the ability to cast a titan the following turn can let you get immediate value off your Titan trigger (with some set up, you can KHE for 12 or even 18 damage). You can make this exact same play with Omen.
- KHE+Omen+Scapeshift: Good 4 land kill that requires no ramp and can let you play with a tight hand. T2 KHE, T3 Omen, Turn 4 Scapeshift Grabbing 4 Valakuts. KHE will find mountains 5-6, enter the battlefield, and do 24 damage.
- KHE+Scapeshift: What the card actually does. Lets you get to 7 lands on turn 4 with only 2 ramp spells. Not relevant a lot of times, but can be your card advantage against controlling or 1 for 1 decks.
That said, the replacement you've suggested looks reasonable. I've played with 2 Omens for about a year. I've seen both of them in a game maybe twice ever, but either one of them often enough to be helpful.
Fetch-Shock-Blog
Moderator of /r/Scapeshift
Nothing feels better than attacking your landfall above the valakut trigger to get the third counter on expedition and push yourself to six mountains before the first valakut triggers resolve. Except using one expedition to get your 3rd counter on another under the same scenario...
BWBAthreos, God of PassageBWB (Shadowborn Clerics)
Not sure what you mean by that. I assume you mean "stacking" instead of attacking. But what really confuses me is the part where you say you can use KHE to "get to 6 mountains before the first valakut trigger resolves". If you don't have 6 mountains when the lands hit the battlefield, valakut doesn't trigger. So if you play a land and sac KHE to get to 6 lands, only the KHE fetched lands trigger, the previous ones never triggered.
This is false. Valakut triggers whenever a mountain enters the battlefield regardless of how many mountains you already have, THEN it checks if you have 5 other mountains.
Rd1 vs Jund 2-0
Rd2 vs Sun and Moon 1-2
Rd3 vs Gr Tron 2-0
Rd4 vs Bant Eldrazi 2-1
Considering switching out the 4th Bolt for a Beast Within to work as kind of a catch-all and (very rarely) a surprise blocker.
Say that to the rules:
Are you sure about that?
This is one of the rulings about Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle :
Darktutor, you're correct that my intention was to type stacking instead of attacking. (iPhone auto-correct)
*edit*
I'm an idiot and didn't read Putriss's ruling closely enough. I'm blaming it on the lack of coffee.
BWBAthreos, God of PassageBWB (Shadowborn Clerics)
The ruling Putriss posted also says that. No triggers unles there's already 5 other mountains on the battlefield.
WGUBR 5c Humans
GWR Naya Zoo
Legacy:
GW GW Maverick
R Goblins
So just to explain for anyone in the future who comes across these posts...
Valakut's trigger is an intervening if, which means that the trigger has to meet an additional clause in order to trigger and is written in the form "When/Whenever/At [trigger event], if [condition], [effect]". In our case, "Whenever a Mountain enters the battlefield under your control, if you control at least five other Mountains, you may have Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle deal 3 damage to target creature or player". If the additional if clause is not met, then the ability does not trigger. So lets say your turn 1 play is Valakut and your turn 2 play is Stomping Ground. When Stomping Ground enters the battlefield, is there a Valakut trigger that goes on the stack? No. If you were playing MTGO, the land would just come in normally with no effects. If that was your 7th land drop, with Valakut and 5 other mountains, then yes, a trigger goes on the stack because you've met both conditions.
The second half of the intervening if is that the conditions are checked again on resolution of the trigger. This is the part most of us are familiar with, knowing how land destruction can fizzle a lethal Scapeshift. Lets say I cast a 7 land Scapeshift and put 6 triggers on the stack (lets say grabbing 5 basic mountains and a stomping grounds), but my opponent has an active Tectonic Edge and destroys the Stomping Grounds that just came in. So each trigger goes to resolve. Basic Mountain 1 checks for 5 other mountains and only sees Basics Mountains 2-5, therefore the second clause of the intervening if is not met and the trigger does not resolve. Basic Mountains 2-5 go through a similar process. Then we get to the trigger caused by the Stomping Ground. This trigger goes to resolve and does see 5 other mountains (Basic Mountains 1-5), therefore the second condition is met and the trigger will resolve.
With this deck in particular, its important to remember that cards like Khalni Heart Expedition, Primeval Titan, Scapeshift, and Harrow put lands onto the battlefield at the same time. This is more evident with Scapeshift, but when the land enters and checks for the second clause of the intervening if, it will count its buddy/buddies that were brought in with it (since these are brought in at the same time due to resolution of the previous trigger/spell). So if you have Valakut + 4 Mountains with a Khalni Heart Expedition, grabbing two mountains from that KHE will net 6 damage since those mountains will be #5 and #6 and "see" each other.
Fetch-Shock-Blog
Moderator of /r/Scapeshift
Your opening hand can be pretty easy to evaluate. IN GENERAL, you would need:
Turn 4 Titan (6 lands): 2 Ramp Spells, 4 land drops, Pact/Titan -or- 3 Ramp Spells, 3 Land Drops, Pact/Titan (Turns 1-3)
Turn 4 Scapeshift (7 lands): 3 Ramp Spells, 4 Land Drops, Scapeshift (Turns 1-4)
It's straightfoward enough that its not hard to remember, but there are some caveats involving Search for Tomorrow & Khalni Heart Expedition (+2 Lands). Scapeshift hands can be more liberal on if you need to find an additional land or ramp spell, because you have the actual turn 4 to draw and cast it (since scapeshift is 4 mana and you need 7 lands) as opposed to a Titan turn which does not leave you with room to cast any extra on that turn.
For me, hands with just ramp spells and non-valakut lands typically go back. Depending on the opponent's deck, ramp spells, valakut, and lands is keepable. Using the above guidance, if your hand has a Titan/Scapeshift/Pact you can judge how keepable it is. I personally like to have payoff cards in my opening hand, since most of the deck is ramp spells and lands I'm more likely to just draw those. Hands with payoff cards and no ramp are mulligan'd depending on the opponents deck (anything fast, def mulligan'd. Anything slow, probably mulligan but think about it).
Hope that helps. SB looks fine. Hate the burn MU, its just naturally bad. If you're really worried about it, I would just throw in some Feed the Clans and call it a day. People were experimenting with Jadi Offshoot in the past in place of Baloth (4-of) with some success. Its good in no-other matchup, but if you play burn a lot could be worth it.
Fetch-Shock-Blog
Moderator of /r/Scapeshift
Thanks for the detailed explanation. I'm sure that I've only 'won'2 or 3 games of paper magic when I counted false valakut triggers. This includes play-testing wins. Thanks for saving me before I tried this during Comp REL.
BWBAthreos, God of PassageBWB (Shadowborn Clerics)
I've gotten decent at explaining it, after doing it so many times. How Valakut works has to be the most mechanically non-intuitive thing in Modern, next to the full Ad Nauseam combo.
Fetch-Shock-Blog
Moderator of /r/Scapeshift
There is one trigger that still resolves in that case, the same if there are multiple valakuts triggering for each mountain. When a mountain is destroyed with the abilities on the stack, the destroyed one will check and will see 5 other mountains so it will resolve, but the other 5 will be countered cause they will only see 4 other mountains. This is why Tectonic Edge works to stop the combo and Ghost Quarter doesn't (it actually adds more damage) unless the person run out of basics somehow.
So tec edge reduces the dmg from 18 to 3 basically (if activated on 7 lands)?
Yes:
Shift for 7: 1 Valakut 6 mountains. You destroy a mountain with Tec Edge (say a stomping ground). The battlefield is now Valakut + 5 mountains. Every trigger for the mountains on the field fizzle because they see 4 other mountains, the mountain you destroyed resolves and deals 3 damage because it sees 5 other mountains.
Shift for 8: 2 Valakut and 6 Mountains. You destroy a mountain with Tec Edge (say a stomping ground). The battlefield is now Valakut + 5 mountains. Every trigger for the mountains on the field fizzle because they see 4 other mountains, the mountain you destroyed resolves both its triggers and deals 3 damage each time because it sees 5 other mountains.
Shift for 8: 1 Valakut and 7 mountains = you're dead unless you have 2x Tec Edge.
There are other examples for more lands, but are very unreal to deal with (unless the person wants to lose and fetches 3 valakuts on a shift for 9 or 4 valakuts on a shift for 10).
EDIT: I know you play jund. So, if you ever play against Blue Scapeshift (either RUG or 4 Color), you should know they only play 2 basic mountains as maximum (4 color usually just 1) and 10 mountains in total, so if you have both GQ and TE or Fulminators, you can disrupt with TE and Fluminator early and force them to fetch the only basic in their deck, then GQ it. It's easier to disrupt them than us.