“ Creatures that crew a Vehicle aren’t attached to it or related in any other way. Effects that affect the Vehicle, such as by destroying it or giving it a +1/+1 counter, don’t affect the creatures that crewed it.”
I'm fully aware how crew works, what I meant is that you'll also tap down a creature to crew, thus it counts as a 3rd creature that can't block this turn. Very often it's not relevant, but might give opponent a window.
I'm still not convinced it's an easy task to play Copter against commands. Obviously Flickerwisp and Resto neuter it, but there is going to be at least one situation each game where you'll either strand 1-2 copters at hand or play them and get brutally 2-for-1'd. A good opponent won't waste it.
But yeah, Kolaghans generally doesn't seem to be played much at the moment, so I suppose it's just my local meta (lots of GDS, and BRx control variants). Online I'm still running copters.
Long-time lurker in this forum, and lover of D&T. Finally feel like I have enough reps/experience now to contribute.
Played B/W E&T at two local events and went 3-1 in each, played against 8 different decks so I have some thoughts on my experience against each.
VS. R/W Prison (1-2):
Seemed to be pretty play/draw dependant matchup as a quick T2 blood moon on the draw is crippling with no way to fetch basics.
One match was lost by T2 moon, and the other loss was pretty grindy, but ultimately lost to timely sweepers. Chalice isn't a big deal thanks to flickerwisp and vial. One matchup was won with T1 vial, T2 thalia, vial-Thraben on the play, followed by tidehallow, TKS taking away sweepers. Overall, as others have experienced this deck is SUPER soft to blood moon if you don't have a vial. Relic warder's hedge a bit, but they aren't enough.
VS. Abzan (1-2):
A very grindy matchup that tends to go into late game. Also pretty play/draw dependant (is there a modern matchup that isn't!?), as T1 inquisition/thoughtseize can be quite disruptive. The effectiveness of hate bears in this matchup seem quite situational. Sometimes they do work (ie. Arbiter when they have fetch heavy hands), but their two drops outclass ours. Lost G1 because of an unanswered dark confidant (path was stripped), and another game I was outgrinded by souls and point removal. An early abrupt decay on Rest in Peace allowed Tarmogoyf and Souls to do work. I was consciously ignoring the jund-y archtypes with my sideboard because I hadn't seen much at my LGS. This matchup would have benefited significantly from Gideon, Ally of Zendikar out of the board, or something similar.
VS. Titanshift (2-1)
Overall I've found this to be a decent matchup. Arbitor and ghost quarter do serious work key here and makes life very difficult for them. Slowing them down and hittin their hand is a good recipe. Post board is harder since they bring in sweepers and/or more spot removal. 3 Forge-tenders and the selfless spirit were very nice counters to that plan. Often countering the sweeper is enough to win the game. I didn't miss Aven mindcensor which I had been using previously. Can win through resolved titans if you have path and GQ.
VS. B/W Smallpox Planeswalkers (2-1)
I knew two of these decks were running around, hence the revoker and selfless spirits in my board. Still I found it to be a tough matchup. G1 is hard because you're soft to sweepers and planeswalkers. Revokers and selfless spirit out of the board helped here. Played against a version with bloodghast and lingering souls, so Rest in Peace was good also. Land light hands without vial are risky since they can attack the shaky manabase pretty well. I can see this being a tough matchup, but T1 vial with Tidehollow/TSK disruption won me both games. Selfless spirit against Damnation was key in one game also. Thraben inspector with smuggler's copter was a hit this game. With only push as spot removal, and copter avoiding damnation, I liked having these.
VS. Grand Architect Blue Steel (2-0)
This felt to me like playing against abzan, mid-rangy but they have less removal and hand disruption, so it's easier I think. Displacer/Tidehollow shenanigans can just go unchecked here since they have very little spot removal. Save path for Grand Architect or Wurmcoil Engine. Arbiter is nearly dead here, so post-board swap of 4x Arbiter for 2x Revoker and 2x Relic-warder is a great sideboard plan. I haven't played the matchup too much, but for sure the right sequencing of disruption here is to tidehallow the enablers (Cheif Engineer, Etherium Sculpter), then save path for big dudes (probably obvious). Just look out for a big ballista.
VS. Mirror Match (2-0)
What can I say about the mirror match...the player with vial wins if the other doesn't have it. Thraben/Copter is great for grinding. You can just outright lose if you're land light against a GQ draw. Revoker is sometimes good, relic-warder isn't bad (copter, vial, tidehollow), but sometimes matches come down to who draws more TKS. I think the copter version is definitely favoured here.
VS. Burn (2-1)
Play first. Draw Forge-tenders. Hope you can live the dream and eat a rift-bolt with Strangler and murder a goblin guide. I defintely had good draws here, and was on the play. But I think this is an unfavourable matchup for E&T. Thraben into Tidehollow (taking bolt, luckily leaving opponent with lava-spike, boros charm, skullcrack in hand) into Strangler-kill-a-dude into TKS got me there G1. That won't happen often. You need a forge-tender or early TKS to have a chance in boarded games. The other game I won, I had T1 forge-tender on the play to thwart his guide. T2 Thalia slowed him down, T3 TKS provided a nice clock. Not sure what the best boarding plan is here, but either way I think you need some luck in this matchup.
VS. Eldrazi Tron (2-1)
I'm not sure if this is supposed to be a good matchup, but I felt pretty comfortable. GQ is good, but not back-breaking. Arbiter is lackluster. Displacer shines here, allowing you to flicker their attacks and dodge all is dust. TKS and tidehollow do nice work taking them off either key sweepers or late-game bombs just long enough. This was actually a fun matchup that feels like it could be very swingy. Each match you feel like being in control, to possibly
facing down a pair of Reality Smasher's in a second. GQ + Thalia + Arbiter + Path + Tidehollow are not silver-bullets, but provide enough disruption to slow them down enough to take this game.
I'm curious what other folk's feelings are towards these matchups, and if they have different/similar thoughts.
Just some more thoughts:
- I really like this maindeck against an open field. I used to have +3 Dark Confidant instead of thraben, and +1 Thalia +1 Stranger in place of copters.
- 3x Thalia might be wrong, but I never felt like this was a silver-bullet in any match. I think the upside to drawing multiples less, is much better than say, killing storm where it shines. But, I could be wrong.
- 2x Strangler might also be wrong. It's great when the stars align, but it is still very situational. I liked 2x. Boarded out frequently.
- Thraben/Copter was fantastic as was discussed above.
- Sideboard felt great, although I think I'll be swapping the relic warders for 2 copies of Gideon, Ally for the grindy matchups. Warder was a concession to having something extra for the affinity players I know lurk around, but maybe even they aren't great there anyways. I do feel uncomfortable without some additional artifact/enchantment removal though.
Still testing, but it is being a blast in cockatrice. Easily won against jund, death's shadow, RDW and many others.
I would like to read what do you feel about 23 lands vs 22.
I play BW E&T too.
I would like to read what do you feel about 23 lands vs 22.
Actually with dark confidant I was on 23 lands also. To be honest I don’t know what’s right, but with this deck I’d rather be on the screw side more than the flood side because of Vial. Most lists that look to be having success are running 22 as well. I’m also curious what others have found. Been pretty happy on 22. Colour screw has been more of a problem than # lands.
I'm at home after the main event the Team Trios GP Madrid. Pretty happy with the teamwork and the performance of the deck. We started with a 3-1, we finished with a 3-3 and drop. My personal record has been 8-4.
Here's the list:
Round 1 vs Scapeshift (2-0):
- Match 1: Pretty standard match with nothings interesting to said. Hit him with my creatures until death.
- Match 2: Tight game that my rival lost because he was greedy or he didn't know so well his deck. Final situation:
Me with Kitchen and Copter, him with nine lands and a Valakut. He cast Scapeshif, sacrifice every land except Valakut and ask if I concede, my partner, who also plays Valakut said no way because he counted and realized that he hadn't had enough mountains to kill me (if he had sacrificed only five lands, I was done). He resolved Scapeshift and searched 4 mountains, 2 Valakut and 3 fetches so no triggers to me. He play a stomping and shot me for 9 to the head. So, I played Thraben, crew Copter and attack with it and Finks leave him to 3. He played Courser of Kruphix and, in response, I activated Vial and put Big Thalia in play so Couser entered tapped and he conceded.
Round 2 vs Humans (1-1)
- Match 1: Slow start for both and I win through flyers, pathing every one of his Mantis.
- Match 2: Mull to 5. I could have recovered but he played a Big Thalia in T2 and all my blockers entered tapped.
No Match 3 because both my partners lose so the Round finished right there.
Round 3 vs Storm (2-0):
- Match 1: Classic match with a peak point when he played a Gifts, paid the Arbiter tax but the sweet sweet trick of flickering the arbiter with Resto in order to forced him to pay 2 more made useless his Gifts.
- Match 2: Match that a Ratchet Bomb was the goblin police and an Eidolon closed.
Round 4 vs Ad Nauseam (2-0):
This Round is an example of what happens when this deck works flawlessly.
- Match 1: Typical hand that a taxes player keeps on the play (I know he was playing Ad Nauseam because he dropped a Lotus Bloom while shuffling): Quarter, Vial, Arbiter, Flicker and other 3 (none of them was a land.
T1: Quarter, Vial
OP T1: Fastland, Serum
T2: Draw Vial, play vial.
OP T2: Mana, Sleight
T3: Draw quarter, play quarter, vial to arbiter, double GQ and rival came back to the Stone Age. Sweeeeet. Both of us hadn't a land but I had two activate vials. XDD
- Match 2 initial hand: 2 Plains, Tectonic, Thalia, Revoker, Flicker and Copter.
OP T1: Mana, Lotus Bloom. So I thought: Well, now I know the Revoker target. XDDD
T1: Plains, go
OP T2: Mana, cantrip.
T2: Plains, Thalia.
OP T3: Mana, go
T3: Mana, revoker to Bloom.
OP T4: Bloom comes into play, he paid 1 due to Thalia, go.
T4: Big Thalia
OP T5: Land, Prism with 3 counters
T5: Flicker to Prism
After that hit after hit, he survived the first lethal hit thanks to Angel's grace, played No-life but another Flicker takes the enchantment out and go for the kill.
Round 5 vs Affinity (1-2)
- Match 1: I put the Air Force in play and crush him through the skies.
- Match 2: T1 Skirge into T2 equipped Cranial. Hit for 8 in T2, 12 in T3. Affinity is his purest essence.
- Match 3: I survived a T2 Ghirapur into T3 Whipflare thanks to a Burrenton and draw a Revoker to bite the Ghirapur. Everything went fine until I made a ginormous mistake: I attacked with the Revoker when he had a blocker that can kill it. Stupid moron myself. After that, I left him at 3 and I draw a Resto that arrived at the end of his turn, I went to the final hit but he had drawn his single dispatch and exile it. Damm.
Without that mistake I'm sure I have the victory and the 4-1 for our team. Arggggg.
Round 6 vs ETron.(0-1)
- Match 1: No much commented. Ballista into Thought-Knot, into Smasher, into Karn, into Endbringer, into second Smasher. That's some curve.
No match 2. My partners lost their games.
Thanks a lot to deathandcatmix for his counseling the night before and he is so damm true when he says that Copter are the REAL DEAL.
That's all folks. Please bury me with questions or doubts.
@xotug I’m glad I was able to give you some support w/ this. Sorry I couldn’t get you a million times more with the short amount of time. I’m alsongladntonseenyoubtried some of my main deck and sb suggestions. I’d love on here or privately a recap of the changes. Anything you liked or didn’t. Congrats for such a great performance.
To everyone, I don’t play a ton of tournaments but I do train very hard for them and have a good support team when making lists for pptq. If you are ever in need of assistance with tuning a list l, please reach out to me on Twitter! I love to take part in preparing people for tournaments.
After the combo heavy decks taking down OKC, am I right to assume that aggressive decks will make a come back to answer them? I mainly play on MTGO, so I’m gonna tune my sideboard for burn and affinity, as well as prep for the combo decks that have come out on top. Is this the right read of the meta? How does this sb look?:
I've been running Stabil0's Death and Staxes deck for quite some time now, but I am feeling like the meta is shifting towards Tron, Scapeshift, and Jeskai (3 Tron, 2 Scapeshift and 1 Jeskai Breach in Top 8 at Oklahoma City) and other decks that might be making Chalice of the Void less good. Don't get me wrong, Chalice is still amazing against Affinity, Grixis Death's Shadow, Burn, Elves, Living End, UR Gifts Storm and it's okay against UWx Control, however it is an auto-sideboard against Urza Tron, Eldrazi Tron, Scapeshift (maybe keep in 1-2 to put on 0), Humans, Merfolk, Company/CoCo and all the other DnT variants.
I personally like the WW builds for consistency, and to maximize LD, but I'm a little out of it. Here's what I am thinking, but I would love some advice. I did try building a consistent WG anti-ETB deck with Tocatli Honor Guard and Hushwing Gryff, but my problem with THG and Dr. Gryff are that the effects are only good if you get them down early enough. The longer the game goes on, the less you want to see them.
Thoughts on
Tec vs. Field? I like Field, and the 1 additional activation seems potentially worth it in a deck where I am running 6 search hate effects main, but that could be wrong.
Dusk // Dawn vs. Settle the Wreckage?
@redtwister Torpor Orb effects: It can be hard to manage your deck to work as a death and taxes.dec when one of your best cards will self-shutted down. You will lose your best trick and Blade Splicer will be an embarassing 1/1 for 2W.
Field of Ruin has its bright sides, but Tec Edge doesn't need any other hate piece to be that good. If you ever want to time walk yourself against tron and affinity by activating in the very first turns, I guess you should have mulliganed into a better hand..
Dusk / Dawn x Settle the Wreckage: I personally prefer Dusk over Wrath because of better flavor and the opportunity of one-side wrath (Reminder: doesn't Kill Dark Confidant, robots without counters, elves with Ezuri and Walking Ballista). About Settle, I wouldn't ever consider it as a Wrath because it only affects attacking creatures and act more like a fog. And thus, that could work just once, since the surprise effect will be forever gone.
After the combo heavy decks taking down OKC, am I right to assume that aggressive decks will make a come back to answer them? I mainly play on MTGO, so I’m gonna tune my sideboard for burn and affinity, as well as prep for the combo decks that have come out on top. Is this the right read of the meta? How does this sb look?:
I really like the side against affinity: Burrenton to avoid Whipflare, Stony to crush them, Unmaking and Fatal as spot removal targeting a fat Etherium Master or an cranial ornithopter; pontiff to clean memnites, skirges and pests. Maybe I would divide 1 zealous, 1 pontiff due to zealous being CMC 2 but I think is a great sideboard.
About Burn, the real hoser is Kor Firewalker but the WW could be difficult to play for E&T, other options could be Kitchen Finks (same problem), Blessed Alliance (less powerful than Kor but more flexible), maybe Kambal (kind of one shot men but could be a possibility)
Talking about Affinity hosers, I kinda discovered during the team analysis for the GP a little piece of masterful hate called Damping Matrix. Not only crush Affinity but another bad pairing for, at least, the mono white Taxes; who is, Vizier. As soon as matrix is on the table, Vizier cannot do anything. All his combos and finishers are broken. He has to find the Reclamation Sage in order to break the matrix or his deck is just a bunch of little men that we're going to trample.
@agua_benta
The deck was WG Hatebears, not DnT. No ETB effects. Thalias, Hierarchs, Arbiters, Smiter, Pridemage, Mindcensor, and then Gonor Guard and Hushwings.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Standard
Tempo Modern
Eldrazi and Staxes
Whir Prison Legacy
5c Humans
DnT
"I'm a lead farmer... !" Quote ruined due to policy.
Thoughts on
Tec vs. Field? I like Field, and the 1 additional activation seems potentially worth it in a deck where I am running 6 search hate effects main, but that could be wrong.
Long answer: Field of Ruin is only better against land-light decks that predominantly run nonbasics (e.g., Affinity, Burn, etc.). The problem is that you're going to give up percentage points against a lot of non-aggro strategies by allowing them to fix their mana when you don't have a search tax. It's going to hurt you against everything from Storm to Jund to Jeskai Control. Generally, I think Tectonic Edge is the right choice against a wide-open field, but I've been running 9-10 land destruction utility lands (4 Ghost Quarter, 4 Tectonic Edge, 1-2 Field of Ruin) in my mono-white D&T lists and it has been extremely effective, so you may just want to run both.
Neither. Wrath of God is the correct choice here. It's the most versatile and effective option.
Dusk/Dawn hurts you against a lot of decks that can go under it, like Affinity and Elves. Having access to Dawn is nice, but it's not worth the cost of running a sub-par Wrath.
Settle the Wreckage is a card that tests the playskill of your opponent. You'll get a few free wins off of careless players, but that's where you need the free wins the least. Good players are going to play around it or minimize the value that you get out of it, so the best option is just to run Wrath and not give your opponents an opportunity to save themselves from the effect.
Thau Mery made top8 in the french rptq this season and he played a snow tech,
he had 2 Gelid Shackles instead of the usual sunlance or dismember.
That it prevents activated abilities makes it more useful vs. company decks and eldrazi tron, it also stops
death shadow at any size (costs mana every turn, but still..). I will definitely try it out.
He also played 1 Militia's Pride, i actually tried that in the past and i'm not a fan, i think if you want such a card,
then anything that can make tokens on its own is just better (like gideon or elspeth)
Mery's list has some interesting tech. I've never seen Shackles before, but it's a versatile tool. I'm not sure I like it more than Journey to Nowhere though, which does something extremely similar.
To me, the most interesting card was the singleton Endless Sands as a utility land. That's pretty spicy. I'm not sure in which matchups it's useful, but I can see it winning topdeck wars as a late-game mana sink. Plus, having the ability to chump block with a Blade Splicer only to put it under Endless Sands seems really great. If you can get both a Blade Splicer and a Flickerwisp under Endless Sands, then you can crack it on your opponent's turn for some gamestate-breaking interactions. The downside is that you need to have a reasonable board state for it to be useful; if your board gets swept before you can put anything under it, it becomes much worse. I still think Endless Sands is probably better than Windbrisk Heights though.
@agua_benta
The deck was WG Hatebears, not DnT. No ETB effects. Thalias, Hierarchs, Arbiters, Smiter, Pridemage, Mindcensor, and then Gonor Guard and Hushwings.
Catmix has actually been working on a mono-white Hatebears list. It seems to work pretty well. You can watch him do some playtesting here.
Playing millions of cards every turn... Slowly and systematically obliterating any chance my opponent has of winning... Clicking the multitude of locking mechanisms into place... Not even trying to win myself until turn 10+ once I have nigh absolute control... Watching my opponent desperately trying to navigate the labyrinthine prison that I've constructed... Seeing the light of hope fade and ultimately extinguished in an excruciatingly slow manner... THAT'S fun Magic.
We have 2-3 users that are dramatically making this thread incomprehensible and non-productive for anyone else to possibly join in the discussion. This needs to change.
Every time I see [ktkenshinx] post in here, I get the impression of a stern dad walking in on a bunch of kids trying to do something dumb and just shaking his head in disappointment.
Near Mint: The same as Slightly Played, but we threw some Altoids in the box we stored it in to cover up the scent of dead mice. Slightly Played: The base condition for all MTG cards. This card looks OK, but there’s one minor annoying ding in it that will always irritate and distract you whenever you draw it. Moderately Played: This card looks like it survived the Tet Offensive tucked inside the waistband of GI underwear. It may smell like it, too. Heavily Played: This card looks like the remains of Mohammed Atta’s passport after 9/11. It may be playable if you double-sleeve it to stop the chunks from falling out. The condition formerly known as "Washing Machine Grade" Damaged: This card is the unfortunate victim of a Mirrorweave/March of the Machines/Chaos Confetti/Mindslaver combo.
[M]aking counterfeit cards is the absolute height of dishonesty. Ask yourself this question: Since most people...are totally cool with the use of proxies...what purpose do [high] quality counterfeit cards serve?
new to the deck, not so new to Modern as a format (I have been playing Living End in the past) and I wanted to drop by to post my decklist for WB Eldrazi & Taxes and ask a couple of questions.
List is pretty straight-forward and the sideboard is currently WIP but I still got some questions for the more experienced E&T players:
1.) I really like Thraben Inspector and wanna play 1-2 pieces but I don't know what to cut from MB. Also is Inspector worth playing without Smuggler's Copter and with Stony Silence in the board?
2.) (Somewhat related to question #1) Should I aim for 22 or 23 lands with this setup? As I am including 2 Dark Confidant it feels like 23 is the way to go but I could see cutting a land for another creature.
Also if I am playing 23 lands is it worth playing an Vault of the Archangel over the single Godless Shrine?
3.) Sideboard question: Stony Silence or Kataki, War's Wage. I feel like Silence is the superior card but is worse than Kataki with Vial, Thalia and Inspector. On the other hand Kataki against Ghirapur Aether Grid in the Affinity MU seems super bad.
4.) Final question: What's this decks plan against any deck running Blood Moon? Is it a good idea to commit 1 SB slot to enchanment removal?
Thanks for anyone helping me out. I am already super-stoked to play this deck at the next FNM.
Your performance at GP Vegas 2017 definitely gave Monowhite players here plenty of encouragement and plenty to talk about; I even think it was the big watershed moment for Thraben Inspector in this forum.
Welcome and thanks for stopping by with more insight!
I’m glad to hear you are on Gideon of the Trials in the board. I had not seen many people testing or trying the card. I agree that is an amazing sb Card for the deck.
I have a question about endless sands? Like a lot of questions. Could you give a bit of insight for where you want that and how you implement it? Thats probably the most interesting thing your list was doing and I need answers. Lol.
Hi Theau big fan of yours here :). When Gelid Shackles rocks against in your matchup ? i like to hear the story about it
Private Mod Note
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Modern
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Boros/Naya/Mardu Burn Abzan Rhino non Noble Hierach not active Jund Tarmoless not active
DnT White
Living End Jund Restore Balance Non Borderpost/ Borderpost not active U/W Titan Control not active Mardu Nahiri/Control not active
Hi Theau, I wanna ask why you dont play dusk//dawn in sb anymore ? there still a lot of aggro match up right ?
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern
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Boros/Naya/Mardu Burn Abzan Rhino non Noble Hierach not active Jund Tarmoless not active
DnT White
Living End Jund Restore Balance Non Borderpost/ Borderpost not active U/W Titan Control not active Mardu Nahiri/Control not active
Thanks for sharing the info and your perspective. I know everyone here appreciates hearing from you. Please stay close to the salvation community and let’s maybe Skype and stream a league sometime! We can private message more if interested!!
I'm still not convinced it's an easy task to play Copter against commands. Obviously Flickerwisp and Resto neuter it, but there is going to be at least one situation each game where you'll either strand 1-2 copters at hand or play them and get brutally 2-for-1'd. A good opponent won't waste it.
But yeah, Kolaghans generally doesn't seem to be played much at the moment, so I suppose it's just my local meta (lots of GDS, and BRx control variants). Online I'm still running copters.
Legacy: Death'n'Taxes
Played B/W E&T at two local events and went 3-1 in each, played against 8 different decks so I have some thoughts on my experience against each.
First the deck:
4 Caves of Koilos
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Eldrazi Temple
4 Ghost Quarter
1 Godless Shrine
2 Plains
2 Shambling Vent
1 Swamp
Creatures
4 Eldrazi Displacer
4 Flickerwisp
4 Leonin Arbiter
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Thought-Knot Seer
3 Thraben Inspector
2 Wasteland Strangler
2 Smuggler's Copter
4 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Æther Vial
Instants
4 Path to Exile
3 Stony Silence
3 Burrenton Forge-tender
2 Rest in Peace
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Leonin Relic-warder
2 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Selfless Spirit
Thoughts on matchups below:
VS. R/W Prison (1-2):
Seemed to be pretty play/draw dependant matchup as a quick T2 blood moon on the draw is crippling with no way to fetch basics.
One match was lost by T2 moon, and the other loss was pretty grindy, but ultimately lost to timely sweepers. Chalice isn't a big deal thanks to flickerwisp and vial. One matchup was won with T1 vial, T2 thalia, vial-Thraben on the play, followed by tidehallow, TKS taking away sweepers. Overall, as others have experienced this deck is SUPER soft to blood moon if you don't have a vial. Relic warder's hedge a bit, but they aren't enough.
VS. Abzan (1-2):
A very grindy matchup that tends to go into late game. Also pretty play/draw dependant (is there a modern matchup that isn't!?), as T1 inquisition/thoughtseize can be quite disruptive. The effectiveness of hate bears in this matchup seem quite situational. Sometimes they do work (ie. Arbiter when they have fetch heavy hands), but their two drops outclass ours. Lost G1 because of an unanswered dark confidant (path was stripped), and another game I was outgrinded by souls and point removal. An early abrupt decay on Rest in Peace allowed Tarmogoyf and Souls to do work. I was consciously ignoring the jund-y archtypes with my sideboard because I hadn't seen much at my LGS. This matchup would have benefited significantly from Gideon, Ally of Zendikar out of the board, or something similar.
VS. Titanshift (2-1)
Overall I've found this to be a decent matchup. Arbitor and ghost quarter do serious work key here and makes life very difficult for them. Slowing them down and hittin their hand is a good recipe. Post board is harder since they bring in sweepers and/or more spot removal. 3 Forge-tenders and the selfless spirit were very nice counters to that plan. Often countering the sweeper is enough to win the game. I didn't miss Aven mindcensor which I had been using previously. Can win through resolved titans if you have path and GQ.
VS. B/W Smallpox Planeswalkers (2-1)
I knew two of these decks were running around, hence the revoker and selfless spirits in my board. Still I found it to be a tough matchup. G1 is hard because you're soft to sweepers and planeswalkers. Revokers and selfless spirit out of the board helped here. Played against a version with bloodghast and lingering souls, so Rest in Peace was good also. Land light hands without vial are risky since they can attack the shaky manabase pretty well. I can see this being a tough matchup, but T1 vial with Tidehollow/TSK disruption won me both games. Selfless spirit against Damnation was key in one game also. Thraben inspector with smuggler's copter was a hit this game. With only push as spot removal, and copter avoiding damnation, I liked having these.
VS. Grand Architect Blue Steel (2-0)
This felt to me like playing against abzan, mid-rangy but they have less removal and hand disruption, so it's easier I think. Displacer/Tidehollow shenanigans can just go unchecked here since they have very little spot removal. Save path for Grand Architect or Wurmcoil Engine. Arbiter is nearly dead here, so post-board swap of 4x Arbiter for 2x Revoker and 2x Relic-warder is a great sideboard plan. I haven't played the matchup too much, but for sure the right sequencing of disruption here is to tidehallow the enablers (Cheif Engineer, Etherium Sculpter), then save path for big dudes (probably obvious). Just look out for a big ballista.
VS. Mirror Match (2-0)
What can I say about the mirror match...the player with vial wins if the other doesn't have it. Thraben/Copter is great for grinding. You can just outright lose if you're land light against a GQ draw. Revoker is sometimes good, relic-warder isn't bad (copter, vial, tidehollow), but sometimes matches come down to who draws more TKS. I think the copter version is definitely favoured here.
VS. Burn (2-1)
Play first. Draw Forge-tenders. Hope you can live the dream and eat a rift-bolt with Strangler and murder a goblin guide. I defintely had good draws here, and was on the play. But I think this is an unfavourable matchup for E&T. Thraben into Tidehollow (taking bolt, luckily leaving opponent with lava-spike, boros charm, skullcrack in hand) into Strangler-kill-a-dude into TKS got me there G1. That won't happen often. You need a forge-tender or early TKS to have a chance in boarded games. The other game I won, I had T1 forge-tender on the play to thwart his guide. T2 Thalia slowed him down, T3 TKS provided a nice clock. Not sure what the best boarding plan is here, but either way I think you need some luck in this matchup.
VS. Eldrazi Tron (2-1)
I'm not sure if this is supposed to be a good matchup, but I felt pretty comfortable. GQ is good, but not back-breaking. Arbiter is lackluster. Displacer shines here, allowing you to flicker their attacks and dodge all is dust. TKS and tidehollow do nice work taking them off either key sweepers or late-game bombs just long enough. This was actually a fun matchup that feels like it could be very swingy. Each match you feel like being in control, to possibly
facing down a pair of Reality Smasher's in a second. GQ + Thalia + Arbiter + Path + Tidehollow are not silver-bullets, but provide enough disruption to slow them down enough to take this game.
I'm curious what other folk's feelings are towards these matchups, and if they have different/similar thoughts.
Just some more thoughts:
- I really like this maindeck against an open field. I used to have +3 Dark Confidant instead of thraben, and +1 Thalia +1 Stranger in place of copters.
- 3x Thalia might be wrong, but I never felt like this was a silver-bullet in any match. I think the upside to drawing multiples less, is much better than say, killing storm where it shines. But, I could be wrong.
- 2x Strangler might also be wrong. It's great when the stars align, but it is still very situational. I liked 2x. Boarded out frequently.
- Thraben/Copter was fantastic as was discussed above.
- Sideboard felt great, although I think I'll be swapping the relic warders for 2 copies of Gideon, Ally for the grindy matchups. Warder was a concession to having something extra for the affinity players I know lurk around, but maybe even they aren't great there anyways. I do feel uncomfortable without some additional artifact/enchantment removal though.
Thanks for reading.
Here's my build, not too far from yours.
4 Caves of Koilos
3 Concealed Courtyard
2 Godless Shrine
4 Eldrazi Temple
4 Ghost Quarter
2 Shambling Vent
3 Plains
1 Swamp
Spells
4 Aether Vial
4 Path to Exile
2 Smuggler's Copter
4 Leonin Arbiter
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Flickerwisp
4 Eldrazi Displacer
3 Wasteland Srangler
1 Blade Splicer
4 Thought-Knot Seer
2 Rest in Peace
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Stony Silence
1 Blessed Alliance
2 Timely Reinforcements
1 Zealous Persecution
1 Orzhov Pontiff
1 Settle the Wreckage
1 Big Game Hunter
1 Sin Collector
2 Gonti, Lord of Luxury
Still testing, but it is being a blast in cockatrice. Easily won against jund, death's shadow, RDW and many others.
I would like to read what do you feel about 23 lands vs 22.
Actually with dark confidant I was on 23 lands also. To be honest I don’t know what’s right, but with this deck I’d rather be on the screw side more than the flood side because of Vial. Most lists that look to be having success are running 22 as well. I’m also curious what others have found. Been pretty happy on 22. Colour screw has been more of a problem than # lands.
WB Eldrazi and Taxes BW
Here's the list:
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Leonin Arbiter
4 Blade Splicer
4 Flickerwisp
4 Restoration Angel
2 Kitchen Finks
2 Smuggler's Copter
2 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
4 Path to Exile
9 Plains
1 Horizon Canopy
4 Ghost Quarter
4 Tectonic Edge
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Sea Gate Wreckage
2 Shefet Dunes
2 Burrenton Forge Tender
2 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
2 Declaration in Stone
2 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Ratchet Bomb
2 Eidolon of Rhetoric
2 Dusk/Down
Round 1 vs Scapeshift (2-0):
- Match 1: Pretty standard match with nothings interesting to said. Hit him with my creatures until death.
- Match 2: Tight game that my rival lost because he was greedy or he didn't know so well his deck. Final situation:
Me with Kitchen and Copter, him with nine lands and a Valakut. He cast Scapeshif, sacrifice every land except Valakut and ask if I concede, my partner, who also plays Valakut said no way because he counted and realized that he hadn't had enough mountains to kill me (if he had sacrificed only five lands, I was done). He resolved Scapeshift and searched 4 mountains, 2 Valakut and 3 fetches so no triggers to me. He play a stomping and shot me for 9 to the head. So, I played Thraben, crew Copter and attack with it and Finks leave him to 3. He played Courser of Kruphix and, in response, I activated Vial and put Big Thalia in play so Couser entered tapped and he conceded.
Round 2 vs Humans (1-1)
- Match 1: Slow start for both and I win through flyers, pathing every one of his Mantis.
- Match 2: Mull to 5. I could have recovered but he played a Big Thalia in T2 and all my blockers entered tapped.
No Match 3 because both my partners lose so the Round finished right there.
Round 3 vs Storm (2-0):
- Match 1: Classic match with a peak point when he played a Gifts, paid the Arbiter tax but the sweet sweet trick of flickering the arbiter with Resto in order to forced him to pay 2 more made useless his Gifts.
- Match 2: Match that a Ratchet Bomb was the goblin police and an Eidolon closed.
Round 4 vs Ad Nauseam (2-0):
This Round is an example of what happens when this deck works flawlessly.
- Match 1: Typical hand that a taxes player keeps on the play (I know he was playing Ad Nauseam because he dropped a Lotus Bloom while shuffling): Quarter, Vial, Arbiter, Flicker and other 3 (none of them was a land.
T1: Quarter, Vial
OP T1: Fastland, Serum
T2: Draw Vial, play vial.
OP T2: Mana, Sleight
T3: Draw quarter, play quarter, vial to arbiter, double GQ and rival came back to the Stone Age. Sweeeeet. Both of us hadn't a land but I had two activate vials. XDD
- Match 2 initial hand: 2 Plains, Tectonic, Thalia, Revoker, Flicker and Copter.
OP T1: Mana, Lotus Bloom. So I thought: Well, now I know the Revoker target. XDDD
T1: Plains, go
OP T2: Mana, cantrip.
T2: Plains, Thalia.
OP T3: Mana, go
T3: Mana, revoker to Bloom.
OP T4: Bloom comes into play, he paid 1 due to Thalia, go.
T4: Big Thalia
OP T5: Land, Prism with 3 counters
T5: Flicker to Prism
After that hit after hit, he survived the first lethal hit thanks to Angel's grace, played No-life but another Flicker takes the enchantment out and go for the kill.
Round 5 vs Affinity (1-2)
- Match 1: I put the Air Force in play and crush him through the skies.
- Match 2: T1 Skirge into T2 equipped Cranial. Hit for 8 in T2, 12 in T3. Affinity is his purest essence.
- Match 3: I survived a T2 Ghirapur into T3 Whipflare thanks to a Burrenton and draw a Revoker to bite the Ghirapur. Everything went fine until I made a ginormous mistake: I attacked with the Revoker when he had a blocker that can kill it. Stupid moron myself. After that, I left him at 3 and I draw a Resto that arrived at the end of his turn, I went to the final hit but he had drawn his single dispatch and exile it. Damm.
Without that mistake I'm sure I have the victory and the 4-1 for our team. Arggggg.
Round 6 vs ETron.(0-1)
- Match 1: No much commented. Ballista into Thought-Knot, into Smasher, into Karn, into Endbringer, into second Smasher. That's some curve.
No match 2. My partners lost their games.
Thanks a lot to deathandcatmix for his counseling the night before and he is so damm true when he says that Copter are the REAL DEAL.
That's all folks. Please bury me with questions or doubts.
To everyone, I don’t play a ton of tournaments but I do train very hard for them and have a good support team when making lists for pptq. If you are ever in need of assistance with tuning a list l, please reach out to me on Twitter! I love to take part in preparing people for tournaments.
WWModern Death And Taxes (w/ Militia Bugler) (JUL '19)
GWModern Maverick (JUL '19)
WBCatmix on Twitch!
WWCatmix on Youtube
2x Burrenton Forge-Tender
2x Sin Collector
3x Stony Silence
2x Rest In Peace
1x Grafdigger’s Cage
1x Anguished Unmaking
2x Orzhov Pontiff
2x Fatal Push
WB Eldrazi and Taxes BW
I personally like the WW builds for consistency, and to maximize LD, but I'm a little out of it. Here's what I am thinking, but I would love some advice. I did try building a consistent WG anti-ETB deck with Tocatli Honor Guard and Hushwing Gryff, but my problem with THG and Dr. Gryff are that the effects are only good if you get them down early enough. The longer the game goes on, the less you want to see them.
Thoughts on
Tec vs. Field? I like Field, and the 1 additional activation seems potentially worth it in a deck where I am running 6 search hate effects main, but that could be wrong.
Dusk // Dawn vs. Settle the Wreckage?
4x Flickerwisp
4x Leonin Arbiter
4x Restoration Angel
4x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4x Blade Splicer
3x Mirran Crusader
2x Aven Mindcensor
2x Eldrazi Displacer
1x Thalia, Heretic Cathar
12x Plains
1x Eiganjo Castle
4x Ghost Quarter
4x Tectonic Edge
1x Field of Ruin
Artifact (6)
4x Aether Vial
2x Smuggler's Copter
Instant (4)
4x Path to Exile
3x Kataki, War's Wage
2x Rest in Peace
2x Worship
2x Burrenton Forge-Tender
2x Dusk // Dawn
2x Sunlance
1x Ratchet Bomb
1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant
Tempo
Modern
Eldrazi and Staxes
Whir Prison
Legacy
5c Humans
DnT
"I'm a lead farmer... !" Quote ruined due to policy.
Torpor Orb effects: It can be hard to manage your deck to work as a death and taxes.dec when one of your best cards will self-shutted down. You will lose your best trick and Blade Splicer will be an embarassing 1/1 for 2W.
Field of Ruin has its bright sides, but Tec Edge doesn't need any other hate piece to be that good. If you ever want to time walk yourself against tron and affinity by activating in the very first turns, I guess you should have mulliganed into a better hand..
Dusk / Dawn x Settle the Wreckage: I personally prefer Dusk over Wrath because of better flavor and the opportunity of one-side wrath (Reminder: doesn't Kill Dark Confidant, robots without counters, elves with Ezuri and Walking Ballista). About Settle, I wouldn't ever consider it as a Wrath because it only affects attacking creatures and act more like a fog. And thus, that could work just once, since the surprise effect will be forever gone.
I really like the side against affinity: Burrenton to avoid Whipflare, Stony to crush them, Unmaking and Fatal as spot removal targeting a fat Etherium Master or an cranial ornithopter; pontiff to clean memnites, skirges and pests. Maybe I would divide 1 zealous, 1 pontiff due to zealous being CMC 2 but I think is a great sideboard.
About Burn, the real hoser is Kor Firewalker but the WW could be difficult to play for E&T, other options could be Kitchen Finks (same problem), Blessed Alliance (less powerful than Kor but more flexible), maybe Kambal (kind of one shot men but could be a possibility)
Talking about Affinity hosers, I kinda discovered during the team analysis for the GP a little piece of masterful hate called Damping Matrix. Not only crush Affinity but another bad pairing for, at least, the mono white Taxes; who is, Vizier. As soon as matrix is on the table, Vizier cannot do anything. All his combos and finishers are broken. He has to find the Reclamation Sage in order to break the matrix or his deck is just a bunch of little men that we're going to trample.
The deck was WG Hatebears, not DnT. No ETB effects. Thalias, Hierarchs, Arbiters, Smiter, Pridemage, Mindcensor, and then Gonor Guard and Hushwings.
Tempo
Modern
Eldrazi and Staxes
Whir Prison
Legacy
5c Humans
DnT
"I'm a lead farmer... !" Quote ruined due to policy.
Long answer: Field of Ruin is only better against land-light decks that predominantly run nonbasics (e.g., Affinity, Burn, etc.). The problem is that you're going to give up percentage points against a lot of non-aggro strategies by allowing them to fix their mana when you don't have a search tax. It's going to hurt you against everything from Storm to Jund to Jeskai Control. Generally, I think Tectonic Edge is the right choice against a wide-open field, but I've been running 9-10 land destruction utility lands (4 Ghost Quarter, 4 Tectonic Edge, 1-2 Field of Ruin) in my mono-white D&T lists and it has been extremely effective, so you may just want to run both.
Neither. Wrath of God is the correct choice here. It's the most versatile and effective option.
Dusk/Dawn hurts you against a lot of decks that can go under it, like Affinity and Elves. Having access to Dawn is nice, but it's not worth the cost of running a sub-par Wrath.
Settle the Wreckage is a card that tests the playskill of your opponent. You'll get a few free wins off of careless players, but that's where you need the free wins the least. Good players are going to play around it or minimize the value that you get out of it, so the best option is just to run Wrath and not give your opponents an opportunity to save themselves from the effect.
Mery's list has some interesting tech. I've never seen Shackles before, but it's a versatile tool. I'm not sure I like it more than Journey to Nowhere though, which does something extremely similar.
To me, the most interesting card was the singleton Endless Sands as a utility land. That's pretty spicy. I'm not sure in which matchups it's useful, but I can see it winning topdeck wars as a late-game mana sink. Plus, having the ability to chump block with a Blade Splicer only to put it under Endless Sands seems really great. If you can get both a Blade Splicer and a Flickerwisp under Endless Sands, then you can crack it on your opponent's turn for some gamestate-breaking interactions. The downside is that you need to have a reasonable board state for it to be useful; if your board gets swept before you can put anything under it, it becomes much worse. I still think Endless Sands is probably better than Windbrisk Heights though.
Catmix has actually been working on a mono-white Hatebears list. It seems to work pretty well. You can watch him do some playtesting here.
WUDeath&TaxesWG
Legacy
UBRGDredgeUBRG
UHigh TideU
URGLandsURG
WR Card Choice List
WUR American D&T
WUB Esper D&T
The Reserved List
Heat Maps
new to the deck, not so new to Modern as a format (I have been playing Living End in the past) and I wanted to drop by to post my decklist for WB Eldrazi & Taxes and ask a couple of questions.
Without further ado I present you my list:
4 Caves of Koilos
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Eldrazi Temple
4 Ghost Quarter
3 Plains
2 Shambling Vent
1 Godless Shrine
1 Swamp
Creatures(29)
4 Eldrazi Displacer
4 Flickerwisp
4 Leonin Arbiter
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Thought-Knot Seer
4 Tidehollow Sculler
3 Wasteland Strangler
2 Dark Confidant
4 Aether Vial
4 Path to Exile
3 Rest in Peace
2 Burrenton Forge-Tender
2 Fatal Push
2 Orzhov Pontiff
2 Stony Silence
1 Anguished Unmaking
1 Blessed Alliance
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
List is pretty straight-forward and the sideboard is currently WIP but I still got some questions for the more experienced E&T players:
1.) I really like Thraben Inspector and wanna play 1-2 pieces but I don't know what to cut from MB. Also is Inspector worth playing without Smuggler's Copter and with Stony Silence in the board?
2.) (Somewhat related to question #1) Should I aim for 22 or 23 lands with this setup? As I am including 2 Dark Confidant it feels like 23 is the way to go but I could see cutting a land for another creature.
Also if I am playing 23 lands is it worth playing an Vault of the Archangel over the single Godless Shrine?
3.) Sideboard question: Stony Silence or Kataki, War's Wage. I feel like Silence is the superior card but is worse than Kataki with Vial, Thalia and Inspector. On the other hand Kataki against Ghirapur Aether Grid in the Affinity MU seems super bad.
4.) Final question: What's this decks plan against any deck running Blood Moon? Is it a good idea to commit 1 SB slot to enchanment removal?
Thanks for anyone helping me out. I am already super-stoked to play this deck at the next FNM.
Your performance at GP Vegas 2017 definitely gave Monowhite players here plenty of encouragement and plenty to talk about; I even think it was the big watershed moment for Thraben Inspector in this forum.
Welcome and thanks for stopping by with more insight!
I’m glad to hear you are on Gideon of the Trials in the board. I had not seen many people testing or trying the card. I agree that is an amazing sb Card for the deck.
I have a question about endless sands? Like a lot of questions. Could you give a bit of insight for where you want that and how you implement it? Thats probably the most interesting thing your list was doing and I need answers. Lol.
Thanks in advance
WWModern Death And Taxes (w/ Militia Bugler) (JUL '19)
GWModern Maverick (JUL '19)
WBCatmix on Twitch!
WWCatmix on Youtube
------
Boros/Naya/Mardu Burn
Abzan Rhino non Noble Hierachnot activeJund Tarmolessnot activeDnT White
Living End Jund
Restore Balance Non Borderpost/ Borderpostnot activeU/W Titan Controlnot activeMardu Nahiri/Controlnot active------
Boros/Naya/Mardu Burn
Abzan Rhino non Noble Hierachnot activeJund Tarmolessnot activeDnT White
Living End Jund
Restore Balance Non Borderpost/ Borderpostnot activeU/W Titan Controlnot activeMardu Nahiri/Controlnot active-Catmix
WWModern Death And Taxes (w/ Militia Bugler) (JUL '19)
GWModern Maverick (JUL '19)
WBCatmix on Twitch!
WWCatmix on Youtube