Ok coming from my own experience, the plan "play all my dudes" against mardu is just a mistake. They always have the answer. Unfortunately, the only way to actually beat them is (oh the irony) having more than one creature in play.
The big big problem here, either way, is that the typical sideboard is just a big fat mess against that deck, lets be honest. What are you gonna do? (in my case) Side in anger of the gods and hornet nests to kill their rabbelmasters, and seekers, just to get destroyed by sarkhans and butchers? Do i even bother bringing in back to nature against that stupid chained to the rocks they always have? How do i apply pressure early enough not to die to rabbelmaster but not to early because i´d rather have protection up against crackling doom for this last threat i have left in my hand?
Best card is probably disdainful stroke, and still that´s pretty underwhelming against crackling doom.
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A huge thanks to Argetlam and the guys at Hakai studios for this awesome banner
Match 1: 4 Color Good Stuff
I go elf, rabble, shaman in game 1. Games 2, my opponent resolves Siege Rhinos on turns 4 and 6 (three and five for me since I'm on the draw). Game 3, I'm at 11 and my opponent is at 5 when he pulls off some wild trick involving Ajani, Mentor of Heroes, haste, a token, and Temur Battle Rage, I would have lived but I take one point of damage from a painland pumping Knucks before the battle rage hits. Notably, it feels like this deck can take on Siege Rhino on equal footing. Afterwords, I realize that I screwed up, exiled torrent elemental with a cruise and forgot I could bring him back.
Match 2: Sultai Control
Game 1: elf, rabblemaster, GG. Games ends with me at 18 life. Game 2: Manascrewed and Colorscrewed. My opponents two Deathdealer gets me down to 8 life when I concede so that I stop giving out info by being forced to discard cards. I end the game with a Mountain and a Temple of Epiphany on the table and two manadorks in hand. Game 3: Comes down to the wire. My opponent casts crux of fate with Slumgar on the field, plays Kiora and bubbles my Knucks (that gets bounced once to get around the effect). I drop a 7/7 wildcall to draw off the bubble and draw into Sarkhan. Going into the last round, I'm at six life and my opponent is at two. Would probably have been dead if fear of a hasted crackback hadn't kept the dragon on the defensive.
Match 3: Blue White Control
Game 1: I really don't remember much except that I'm surprised that my opponent is not playing Heroic. Game 2: Two Shaman plus a Rattleclaw Mystic kill my opponent quickly. I get to use Monastery Siege for the first time on dragons mode. Game 3: is a slugfest. I resolved 2 Monastery Sieges on Dragons. My opponent resolves one on Khans, which allows him to loot into countermagic. Game ends with an ultimated Elspeth. I've boarded out the elementals and Icy Blasts. I've got enough creatures to pressure his token, but not get through to elspeth on the ground. My notes show that I go from 19 life, to 7 (4 3/3 flying tokens), to dead. My opponent goes as low as 3 life before a radiant fountain takes him to 5, sealing the deal. I get one last chance to win with all my opponents creatures and mana tapped out, casting a treasure cruise for U with an untapped mystic. I draw three land and die. After the game I find that the nearest Dragon/Sarkhan was ten cards down from the point where I died.
Match 4: Red White Aggro
Game 1: (On the draw) Mana screwed. After mulling a no lander (and shuffling like hell) I keep a one lander with Elvish and Rattleclaw mystics only to have my opponent fry them. My opponents Monastery Swiftspear and Goblin Rabblemaster make short work of me. Game 2: to lower my curve I board out all the 5 drops and bring in 3 Crater's Claws and 2 Singing Bell Strikes. I draw none of these cards in game 2. Doesn't really matter, my opponents deck turns out to be mostly burn (I died to creatures game 1). We're at 7 to 6 life before my opponent drops a Seeker of the Way and pulls the game away. Got into the car kicking myself for not siding in Monastery Siege.
Ok so, upshots I suck at magic. Overall record on games 4-7.
Worst Card of the Day: Xenagos, The Reveler. I think I drew this card in almost every game. He got some work done, but I wish I'd just maindecked Crater's Claws.
Needs to go: Treasure Cruise normally, I found myself casting this card for around 5 mana. I never had a problem casting it (except for countermagic) but always seemed to have UU available. Sorcery speed is just too slow. If there was ever a spell you want to cast on your opponents end step after they've tapped out, this is it. For exiling Torrent Elementals Dig Through Time would be better. If you don't care about the elementals, Jace's Ingenuity or even Shamanic Revelation are better options.
On the fence: Rattleclaw Mystic was helpful when playing against control. I lost a game to him getting killed. Keeping for now, I could just as well have drawn two elvish mystics.
Felt good, not sure it actually was good: Wildcall. Most of the time I found myself casting this for 5 mana. The presence of a 7/7 able to swing for lethal resulted in my only match win. It's a bear, but its also significantly less likely to be dead in your hand. I also think I remember getting this off as a 3/3 and a 4/4 in other games. Casting as a sorcery is useful for fueling delve. Theoretically, creating a creature with a spell makes it harder for control to have the correct countermagic. I wouldn't know, out of six games against control, I only drew this card once. I have to wonder if Boon Satyr or Yasova Dragonclaw wouldn't be better in this slot.
Seemed to work: Icy Blast and Torrent Elemental. I was going to play a R/G deck, and perhaps should have. I goldfished it with the premise of the goldfish always casting either Siege Rhino or Tasigur on turn 4 and asked myself if I could win. Honestly, these cards were really only relevant in one match all day. If I honestly thought that Abzan was dead, I'd say pull them. I suspect I was dealing with a divergent meta with Monastery Siege killing the control and burn decks into the losers bracket. The poor performance my deck put up does not say good things about it, or about the skills of the player.
I never drew Singing Bell Strike nor faced a deck with a good reason to board in Back to Nature.
Some notes: Casting spells with mostly a single colored mana requirement (and double being GG) meant I took surprisingly little land pain. Also, Shamanic Revelation might be worth a second look. The board tends to develop to a state where you have two creatures that trigger ferocious and at least one mana dork on it.
Going forward, I'm thinking of something like this:
I really don't know what to do about Elvish Mystic. I tried playing them with Rabblemaster, hated it, and now I'm dropping them and Rabblemaster from my list. I find myself siding at least 1 or 2 out in every match because I honestly don't know what else is a good cut. Usually, they seem like the weakest card, even though they are a great boon to get ahead on mana, the Turn 1 dork just rarely happens in a deck with 4 taplands and only 4 dorks. I'm thinking I will cut them entirely. Ideally running something like this:
Magma Spray is back because I expect to see Flamewake and Ashcloud Phoenixes running around, and they annoy me.
For the 4 unknown spots, I am thinking about +2 Sylvan Caryatid, +2 Lightning Strike (OR Wild Slash). Seeing more Mantis Riders recently. Temur Charm is also an option; it served me pretty well in the past.
It looks like the plan for this deck is to have as high of a density of Ferocious creatures as possible, enabling Flamewake Phoenix reursion and a bunch of burn to close off the game. Blue looks to be in there just for Knuckleblade and sideboard slots.
I also don't think Elvish Mystic is a good choice for this deck. It messes up the mana early, and we don't have any good way of taking advantage of the mana boost turn 2. I agree with the earlier comments about Shaman of the Great Hunt. Sometimes he's amazing, other times he is terrible. I hardly ever activate his ability, but it is nice knowing that it is available. I decided to cut Flamewake Phoenix for now; it is a great card, but it is best in a matchup that is already good for this deck (control decks). The matchups where it is bad (aggro decks) it is awful, and it isn't that great against midrange decks. A card that has been amazing has been Whisperwood Elemental. Against aggro, he shuts down their ability to attack; against control, he is a one man army that can provide boardwipe protection; and against midrange, he allows us to fight the attrition war. He gives this deck a play on turn five that puts us in a position to win. He also allows us to flood on land and not lose the game. By manifesting the top card of our deck, it is almost like drawing a card every turn.
So Jacob Eckert got 3rd place in Premier IQ last weekend. The list looks pretty much vulnerable to RDW and burn spells, but somehow it worked. Perhaps the Barrage of Boulders in sideboard covers that match up. The sideboard pretty much swaps gameplay when you're on the draw. Surrak Dragonclaw flash allows to play him whenever you're not playing counterspells. Among all sideboard cards, I missed Hunt the Hunter the most. Great card against Abzan, plus with the latest rise of Mono Green with Temur Ascendancy decks lately.
With the move away from green creatures towards going heavier on red, Hunt the Hunter has just gotten worse and worse. I've dropped it since it's becoming harder to get valid targets for it. Plus without Polukranos, only Knuckleblade can fight a Siege Rhino (or any 4-power creature) and not die after the pump. I suppose it's ok against Abzan Aggro still but only if you have enough green creatures. Eckert's list doesn't even have Heir of the Wilds, and Rattleclaw isn't surviving a fight.
With the move away from green creatures towards going heavier on red, Hunt the Hunter has just gotten worse and worse. I've dropped it since it's becoming harder to get valid targets for it. Plus without Polukranos, only Knuckleblade can fight a Siege Rhino (or any 4-power creature) and not die after the pump. I suppose it's ok against Abzan Aggro still but only if you have enough green creatures. Eckert's list doesn't even have Heir of the Wilds, and Rattleclaw isn't surviving a fight.
Hm I think the point of this is list is dealing enough damage so that the Rhino won't matter.
I mean, if you have 3 4/4s when Rhino comes down you can just swing them and burn away the rest of the life he has.
If Rhino is your main concern then hunt the hunter it is. How about reality shift? I'm surprised nobody tried that card yet.
What do you guys think of combination between Crystalline Nautilus and Monastery Siege ? Most of our creatures pretty much vulnerable to burn and removal spells, so why not the three drop 4/4 ? At best, it comes another Savage Knuckleblade.
There are better 3-drops then Squidies but the Monastery Siege is a good sideboard card, I think, versus abzan and other heavy removal decks.
@RealOG47, why run Frost Walker and whipies in the same deck. They seem to want to do different things, one be aggressive and one sit back and build an army.
@Everyone, has reality shift been that bad for everyone? I've yet to try it but it seems fairly good versus Courser.dec to know what they are getting as a 2/2. It also doesn't seem to bad with our own scrylands to save a creature from death.
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"We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain bad at Magic."
-Benjamin "The Innovator" Franklin
Standard:
Nothing, hate standard after Rhino
Modern:
Looking at Evolution Decks, RUG or [mana]WRG[mana]
Legacy:
Shardless Foundry ('Cause I have a crippling addiction to Shardless Agent)BUG (and I'm to broke for goyfs)
EDH: RGUSurrak Dragon Tribal!RGU URArjun StormUR GUEzuri TokensGU GRBUYidris GoodstuffGRBU
I've been playing reality shift in my board and I think it's pretty good.
We have limited ways to deal with x/4+'s outside of crater's claws, reality shift is a good way to do that. We can easily beat a 2/2 in combat, and about 60-80% of the time they will not get a creature, or at least a creature worth flipping over. It also gives us a way to kill ashcloud phoenix, and mid-late game deathdealers.
Here's the list that I've been running recently. I 3-1ed the last mtgo daily I played, lost to r/w heroic (they get turn 3 kills!).
I played flamewake phoenix for awhile, but I don't like it. The deck (at least my version) seems to shift roles a bit, and flamewake does nothing on defense. It's good against control decks and controlling midrange decks, but we are already really good against those decks because we play 4 copies of a 1 cmc counterspell, and we have access to card-draw. I think boon satyr is far better in that spot. Not only does boon satyr have flash and trigger ferocious, but the bestow lets our guys trade with rhinos as well as act as a pseudo counter against damage and toughness based removal. It's far more flexible than the phoenix is.
The only thing I'm not 100% sold on in my deck is whether I should be running a maindeck treasure cruise or the 3rd shaman. Sometimes I can't cast cruise when I need to, but when I do it's ridiculous. Like-wise, the shaman is at a weird spot on the curve, and I find that you don't want a lot of 4+ drops, since you want to hold up counter magic too, but when he can get in a hit or draw cards, he's the best card in our deck.
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
There are better 3-drops then Squidies but the Monastery Siege is a good sideboard card, I think, versus abzan and other heavy removal decks.
@RealOG47, why run Frost Walker and whipies in the same deck. They seem to want to do different things, one be aggressive and one sit back and build an army.
@Everyone, has reality shift been that bad for everyone? I've yet to try it but it seems fairly good versus Courser.dec to know what they are getting as a 2/2. It also doesn't seem to bad with our own scrylands to save a creature from death.
I'm running Whisperwood mainly because it is an outstanding card at stabilizing a board state vs aggro, and it is a one-man army vs midrange and control. The problem we face is that we have a lot of cards that help us kill our opponent fast, but we are bad vs decks that are as fast or faster than us. Against those decks, Whisperwood shuts down their aggression. Against the decks we are faster than, he makes essentially a 2/2 token every turn, which is great in conjunction with Shaman of the Great Hunt. So, overall my deck is very aggressive with Frost Walker, but it has the ability to go into the midgame when necessary.
The problem with Reality Shift is that a lot of our creatures have 2 or less toughness, so it will usually be a 2 for 1 against. Bounce and burn has worked for me, with additional utility out of Temur Charm.
Edit: One more point on Whisperwood Elemental. One thing I've noticed with this deck is that it is usually very good when ahead and very bad when behind. Whisperwood is one of the few cards that we have available to us that is okay when ahead, but very good when behind or at parity. That I think is the best thing it has going for it.
I also have two slots that I'm going to be freeing up. I'm going to 3x Wild Slash and 2x Temur Charm. I was thinking I might want a high impact card for those last two slots. I am currently trying to decide between Xenagos, the Reveler; Chandra Pyromaster; Jace, the Living Guildpact; or Yasova Dragonclaw. I like Jace as a tempo play and a way of continually drawing gas; Xenagos is great with both Shaman of the Great Hunt and Whisperwood; Chandra is a solid card; and Yasova is good as a three drop that helps beat face. Any opinions?
Game 1: Mono Red Sligh 2-1 (1-0)
Game 2: Sultai Control 2-0 (2-0)
Game 3: Jeskai Ascendency Combo 1-2 (2-1) - Just barely lost this one. If I had countered a DTT instead of holding the counter for jeskai ascendency I would have won it.
Game 4: Naya Mid-range 2-0 (3-1)
Synopsis: The deck has been great. It's fast and puts a lot of pressure on the opponent early. The amount of flyer keeps the attacks versatile and lets me get past big stuff on the ground. Boon Satyr is a house, especially with Flamewake Pheonix. I really like this build as far as the creatures go. My biggest questions now are Sb and the spells I'm running in the MB. I've also been toying with the idea of frost walk in heir of the wild's spot but am not sure.
I went 3-0-1 last night with this playing against GR ramp, Jeskai Tokens, and Sidisi whip (I ID'd the last round). I've been really impressed with Frost Walker (the reason i beat whip game one). The game one against aggro can be rough, hence the angers/arc lightning count in the board. The ascendancy is bonkers against slower midrange decks and control variants because they won't usually have an answer for it and you can just card advantage them into oblivion (especially when everything I do against them post-board is a must answer). I plan on sticking with and tweaking this deck for a little while, so any suggestions are more than welcome.
On reality shift, I have found it very good because in the post games against decks i want it against, I tend to board out some number of X/2's anyway (like shaman), so the makes the 2/2 I give them less of an issue. Got to go to christmasland last night, reality shifting a stormbreath and manifesting an Ugin (which he had the mana for). My opponent was not happy.
EDH is like French fries: some people like waffle cut, crinkle cut, or plain old straight cut, and while there's slight flavor difference and personal preference, at the end of the day they're still fries.
Regarding Hunt the Hunter, I actually think Savage Punch is a way better option for a sideboard slot in Temur. Yes, it is slightly more expensive, but you are very likely to trigger Ferocious and there are many more targets for it on both sides of the board.
Tournament Report – January 31st, 2015
Preliminary Pro-Tour Qualifier - Vancouver // Herkimer, NY
Record: 5-2-1
Final Standing: 2nd place
I hadn't played in a competitive Standard event since the release of Fate Reforged, nor had I played in one during the latter few weeks. I'd played in one of the last (actual) PTQs in the area with the 4-Color Soul/Delve deck. I brought both the 4-Color Delve deck and the Temur Monsters deck with me for the event, eventually deciding on Temur because of my familiarity with the archetype, and the plethora of U/B Control lists I was expecting.
Fate Reforged brought a bunch of new cards for Temur: Shaman of the Great Hunt, Yasova Dragonclaw, Wild Slash, and Reality Shift. I had contemplated things like Flamewake Phoenix, Frost Walker, Monastery Siege, and Whisperwood Elemental; but the Phoenix seemed less impressive than my current 3-drops and unable to turn on Ferocious by itself. Frost Walker was a bit too fragile for my tastes. Monastery Siege didn't have enough immediate impact. And Whisperwood Elemental competed with Stormbreath Dragon, Surrak Dragonclaw, and Nissa, Worldwaker for 5-drop spots.
Round 1 vs. Derek P. [UB Control] 2-0 WIN
Getting paired against Derek was both hilarious and unfortunate...for him. I was his worst matchup, and we've played enough games for him to know the matchup inside and out...and that it was basically a freebie for him. When most of my deck reads: "you take 4," then it's hard for a control deck to come back from that. Indeed, when backed up by counter magic like Stubborn Denial and Disdainful Stroke it's almost impossible. Game 2 ended off the back of a timely Surrak Dragonclaw coming down on his end step after he had exhausted all his removal spells.
Round 2 vs. Orren T. [Jeskai Tokens] 2-1 WIN
Jeskai Tokens is one of the deck's hardest matchups. Game 1 was close. With both of us at 2 while he had the last pieces of burn to take me out. I misused Yasova; instead of attacking with her, I should have just continued to steal his creatures and hold her back. Instead he was able to kill her in combat and keep me on the back foot. Game 2 was different. I had compete control. Arc Lightning and Wild Slash were all stars in keeping his board clear. Game 3 was much closer. But those same cards kept me from dying.
Round 3 vs. Jake K. [RW Aggro] 1-2 LOSE
The RW deck shares many cards with Jeskai, so the matchup is equally difficult. I was able to take Game1 pretty handily. Though I stumbled in Game 2. In the clincher, I kept 1 land mull-to-6 and didn't hit the second land until it was way too late.
Round 4 vs. Stephen R. [RW Aggro] 2-1 WIN
I managed to take the last two games of this round. I wasn't able to get my footing in the first though. As with Jeskai Tokens, Wild Slash and Arc Lightning were all stars. And between them and my much larger creatures, I took the last two.
Round 5 vs. Andrew G. [Sultai Control] 1-1-1 ID
After doing some quick math, we both realized we were locked in for Top 8 as long as we drew.
Quarterfinals (Top 8) vs. Andrew G. [Sultai Control] 2-0 WIN
As it always seems to go, I end up playing my draw from the previous round of Swiss I. The Top 8. He was on Sultai Contril. But like UB, these matchups are very easy. I took damage from my fetch and pain lands, and that was it. Everything else was my creatures pushing through.
Semifinals (Top 4) vs. Carlos C. [GR Aggro] 2-0 WIN
It had been quite a while since I'd played a GRx mirror. I was undefeated in Monsters Mirrors lifetime during the RTR-THS era standard, and was hoping to continue my streak through this season too. Game 1 was tough, but I had it in the bag. He was a bit more Aggro-centric than my build, which allowed me to slow down and take a punishing route. The end was a Crater's Claws to the dome. Game 2 was VERY close. He got me down to 2, while I swung to clear his entire board except an elvish mystic and drop him to 1. He drew an Ashcloud Phoenix that I saw revealed off ofCourser of Kruphix. And I was pretty sure I was set. Then he revealed a Chandra, and I thought I was dead; thinking he could cast the Chandra, ping me, and attack for lethal with his elf. His lands, however, betrayed him. One of his 4 lands was a Mana Confluence, and he wouldn't have been able to cast Chandra and attack on the same turn.
Finals vs. Zach M. [RW Aggro] 0-2 LOSE
Zach and I split the prize payout before playing and decided to just play for the invite to the Regional PTQ. I did my best Game 1, and almost had it. But some timely burn put me out of range. By the start of Game 2, I'd been playing for more than 7 hours and was tired. I took a mulligan to 6 and kept a hand with 4 Elvish Mystics and 2 lands...they almost got me there. But in the end it just took me WAY too long to get anything going.
Here are my general sideboard notes for the day, broken down by archetype.
Notes: If they're playing Green, they often end up playing Kiora. In that case it's sometimes right to keep a Wild Slash in as insurance. Elvish Mystics are also notoriously bad Topdecks, so if you're on the draw, you don't mind removing one.
RWx Aggro:
IN: 1x Stubborn Denial, 3x Arc Lightning, 1x AEtherspouts, 1x Reality Shift, (2x Back to Nature) OUT: 3x Boon Satyr, 2x Stormbreath Dragon, 1x Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
Notes: Sometimes it feels right to bring in Back to Nature. It's a solid card when your opponent is casting Chained to the Rocks and Jeskai Ascendency. I'm still not sure if that's the right thing to do though.
Notes: I brought out a lot of 1-ofs because I wasn't quite sure which of them was best/worst in this matchup. The deck runs a lot of 4/2 creatures, so with my opponent playing Magma Jet and Lightning Strike I knew they probably weren't great. There was, of course, the chance that the opponent sided-out those burn spells, but having those out already seemed like a good idea.
Overall I had a great time. The deck performed really well, even if I didn't at times. Would I play this deck again? Absolutely. I'm still King of the Monsters.
Changes I would make
-1 Shaman of the great hunt
+1 ???
Shaman was a great draw into an open board, and in general he was really nice to have. I think the 4th shaman is too greedy on the mana base and I would swap him out for a smaller creature, I'm not sure what though. I think this deck was a poor choice for the meta I expected, the main reason I didn't sleeve another 75 is due to time constraints. That being said I am fairly comfortable with this deck and could have won the event. The worst mu for my list is RW aggro, especially token based strategies + burn. The morning of the event I decided to drop the 4th sb stroke for the 3rd Bow and I don't regret it at all. Bow is such a house against the decks where you want it, the legendary status sucks to be sure, but if you have one of these in play you should be winning.
Sb plans:
I built the deck to have a good g1 mu vs Abzan (all variants), control and be reasonable vs gb strategies, UW Heroic and RW/Mardu. I think that the worst g1 mu is going to be RW followed by heroic.
RW: -2 disdainful stroke, -4 frost walker, -2 flamewake phoenix, on the draw -1 rabblemaster +3 bow of nylea +1 lightning strike +1 arc lightning +1 wild slash +2 anger of the gods on the draw +1 keranos
Here their tokens match up really well with your walkers, you don't mind trading 1 for 1 with them (ever) but when their raise the alarm gets a walker + dude it kinda sucks. For that reason, in the game I will typically sit on my walkers until they have something I want to block and try and trade them up for removal or rabbles or w/e. the flamewake phoenix is a house against any opponent looking to grind, but vs RW they just want to end it, m2 flamewake is an incredibly common play. On the draw your rabbles don't match up to theirs (1 turn late ofc) so I typically like to take some out. If they are light on tokens, I will keep the walkers in over the rabbles. Bow of nylea has a lot of power in these mu's where they are trading 1 card for 3 dmg, being able to put your guys out of burn range is nice too. the rest don't need explanation
Control: the variants of control are typically UBx, UW and you could consider some abzan decks "Control"; -3 lightning strike -4 heir of the wilds +1 disdainful stroke +1 keranos +2 nissa +2 negate + 1 Surrak (U based). G1 is almost always a free win, every creature sans the heir is a true threat to them and most of them bring back Flamewake, making it impossible for them to gain control on board wipes. I have never lost vs control in a Bo3, all you ahve to do is play flamewake phoenix and then a creature that triggers his ferocious and attack him until he is dead. Most of the time by about turn 12-15 my opponent is asking how many cards in hand "5~" and they are flabbergasted. Their is not enough removal in their deck to handle 4 flamewakes and 24 other creatures. You have to with hold the grin when they blight your flamewakes, in their head they think your only play is two 2/2's, but your sitting on 3 4/4's just waiting to murder them every single turn. Our most relevant creatures have haste and I kept 1 boon satyr in to give control fits. He also helps with Yasova and finishing games with the phoenix (but w/e).
UW Heroic: -2 disdainful strokes +1 wild slash +1 lightning strike. This is one of the other decks I have sleeved and I have won multiple FNMS and win-a-box events with it. I know the mu pretty well and it just becomes a race, if the UW heroic is running 4 ordeal of heliods, they are favored, if they are running the heliod's pilgrim suite, you have a really good chance of racing them. I used to have a lot more dedicated sb slots for this mu, but since I didn't think it was going to show well I planned for other decks. As I said, I wasn't expecting this deck to make a large appearance and it barely showed. We will see if this wax in UW heroic is permanent, I think that Grandmaster makes racing WR(u) hard and that was/is a prevalent MU. I didn't face this deck in the tournament and it didn't top 8, I was "Prepared" though.
Abzan: -3 lightning strike +1 disdainful stroke +2 nissa on play, on Draw -2 rabblemaster +1 keranos +1 strike. I Wanted to have a good mu vs this deck in g1 because I felt that whoever won the die roll was probably going to win this. For that I added 2 Dstrokes to the mb and had 1 in the side. I think that Siege rhino is blatanly overpowered and every time I see him w/ a courser I watch the win % in my head drop like a brick. This mu was also the main reason why I went to 4 heirs mb. Previously I was running 1 ashcloud phoenix, 1 polukranos and 2 stubborns main in their place. I found that those 4 helped my already absurd control MU and the heirs dngaf about abzans creatures. Flamewakes are also incredibly important here because they will get in for a good chunk of dmg well before the roc's come out. if the roc's come out in pairs, you have probably lost, but, if in g1 you can fight through them with either strikes + recursion or shaman pumps. Speaking of shaman, this deck is chock full of stuff that Abzan has to tap out to deal with, this means that if you sequence it right, you will almost always get a hit in with a shaman, and then their rhinos simply trade (something I'm okay with). Knucks is the nuts in this mu because he can simply run over everything they do and requires immediate attention. There are going to be games where they draw 4 pieces of removal, gain 10 life off of courser and drop 3 rhinos... No one is winning that, especially not the aggro deck w/ no lifegain. Sorin can also be a problem for you, he isn't bad when they have to make a vamp, but when he can give 12+ point life swings, you start thinking about the next game. i would say that if the Temur plays first it's about 70% win ratio. if the Abzan goes first it's about 65% win ratio... That's about as close as this deck gets to beating rhinos g1. post board g2 you can simply out tempo them with turn 3 w/e into t4 stroke/charm. you can diversify your threats with nissa and keranos as well. overall I think post board games get a little better and the w/l ratio on the draw is about 40%
Mardu: overall I think mardu won't produce enough removal to kill all of your guys and their plan is pretty weak to your removal. I would say that this should be a favorable mu overall. I don't have that much experience with it though.
GB devotion/whip: if they can play a whip and do something else that turn, you have probably lost. If they don't get that privilege then you win. I would consider this a fairly favorable MU. Not as favorable as U based control decks, but a lot closer to that end of hte equilibrium than RW. -1 strike +1 stroke
Onto the Report
R1: Sultai Control. I was paired with a Vancouver local playing Sultai control. G1 I started with flamewake, knucks, couple of lands and a strike. I didn't know his list but put him on Abzan when he played the GB Scry land. fortunately the first 2nd lands I played were bivouac and Temple of Ab so I was able to change over to Flamewake on turn 3. I drew into another flamewake, he blighted both and I passed turn. turn 5 I played a knucks, gave him haste and resurrected the phoenix, hitting him for 6. He played vault and I hit him for 6 again, I didn't bring back the 2nd phoenix since I had shaman in hand. He popped vault when I declared attacks, on his turn he played land and passed back. I showed him the shaman on my next main phase and it was off to game two. In game two I boarded in two nissas and he boarded in tasigur and deathdealer to block with. I ended up losing game two to a huge mistake, I thought that his life total was 6 and after hitting him with phoenix and stormbreath the previous turn. he was holding onto lands, but I sensed he was in topdeck mode for removal and had the nissa in hand. I played the nissa, made a 4/4 and attacked with the lethal team, he Hero's D'd my stormbreath and looked at me expecting some sort of burn, I didn't realize that he was at 8 life... he won on the crack back. I could have animated the land and just swung in w/ the phoenix. if he had the removal, I would have been able to dbl block and then make another 4/4 the next turn. Unfortunately I had life totals wrong. G3 I slaughtered him, unfortunately I don't remember the details. 2-1
R2: 1-1-1 RW Grandmaster burn. R2 I plaed against another Vancouver local, this time it was a guy that I had been playtesting for the previous two hours against. We knew that the mu was a coin toss and decided to hedge and draw. We played for fun though and it was extremely close. I'm glad I took the draw, the final game didn't finish but it was very even. Draw
R3: Abzan aggro. This match was a little frustrating for my opponent. I won the dye roll and proceeded to t2 frost walker t3 rabble (he BB'd it) t4 shaman, he was playing catch up for 3 or so turns while stuck at 3 mana. At first consideration, being stuck at 3 mana really sucks, but in hindsight he drew nothing but removal. I won g1 in sordid fashion but I felt bad he was mana screwed. I didn't get to see that many creatures in G1, but I did see a deathdealer, which tells me aggro variant. I sided in my 4th strike and the stroke and took out two rabbles. G2 I striked his turn 2 play and then played Knucks on t3, turn 4-6 I held open to counter his plays with my 2 temur charms and 1 stroke. Knucks went most of the way and then shaman got down for the final atk of 8 points. 2-0
R4: GB whip. This was the 3rd Vancouver player I played against (less than 10/200 and I play 5). I didn't know what list he was running before the tournament, but he went to time in round 3 so I was able to watch some of his games. G1 i kept a hand w/ knucks and frost walker plus strike and lands, he thoughtsiezed the walker and killed the knucks, I got kinda flooded and the game took about 20 mins but he eventually won. G2 i overwhelmed him wit rabbles into shaman, just playing tap out aggro until he died. G3 was similar except i sided the rabblemasters for nissas and Keranos. he played 4 satyrs and a couple of coursers but in the end I was able to kill him with a 6/6 phoenix that I boon satyr'd for GG. 2-1
R5: Sultai control. This round was 2-0, I don't even remember the details, the only thing that I remember is charm fighting his tasigur g1 w/ knucks and then charm countering it g2 as knucks and frost walker beat him to death. 2-0
R6: Mardu good stuff w/ the guy that got 2nd. This was my 4th pairing vs a Vancouver local and the one that I didn't really care to play. I wasn't sure what list he was on because he had been piloting a couple different decks in the week prior, but he is a solid player. G1 he won the dye roll, we both played draw go until turn 3 when I started with Walker into phoenix, trying to force his crackling doom. he played around it a bit and eventually crackled my knucks. The next turn he played Stormbreath and put me to 14. I replied with a savage knuckleblade and swung back, putting him to 11. He played the phoenix and got in for 6, I got in w/ knuck and put him to 7, then m2 phoenix. He connected with his phoenix and I blocked the stormbreath, putting me to 6 and him at 7. At this point I was in top deck mode and so was he, going into my turn he had 1 card in hand that he topped. I knew that if he had removal in hand I was dead anyways since I couldn't block w/ phoenix anymore and he would just kill my potential blocker and swing w/ stormy. I was all in on my draw. It was a stormbreath...
I cast the stormbreath and saw the sullen look on his face, I swung in w/ the team for the lethal blow. Since he was at 7 I couldn't just hit with 2 and win, I had to get in with both dragon and knucks. Giving him another draw with 15 or so removal spells seems like a bad idea. As I finished declaring attackers and went to dmg phase, preparing to go to g2 he taped RWB and cast crackling doom. Off to g2. in game 2 I rolled him over with heir and walker then shaman into shaman. it was quick and we moved to g3. for g3 i sided out my rabbles, since I expected him to side them back in, and he did. He got the trip rabble hand and I didn't see enough removal or Anger. Loss 1-2 If I had won this match, I was all but guaranteed to hit top 8. Being 5-0-1 in an 8 round tournament is a good place to be.
R7: Abzan Aggro. This was the final Vancouver opponent I faced and it was fairly quick. He won the dye roll and started w/ a t1 Warden of the first tree. his t2 play was a cipt land so he only got in for 1 dmg. I kept mana open on my turn 2 to strike his guy in response to pumps, but he never pumped. I took the 1 and when he passed I striked, he responded with Val Stance. I shrugged and untapped and striked it again. he played a lion on t3 and I responded with an heir, I was happy when he offered the trade, and the follow up rhino was fine as well. I played knuck and passed back. he got in for 4 (11 or so) and passed turn, I played Shaman and he killed knucks then blighted shaman. I drew a frost walker to compliment my craters claws and killed his rhino. He top decked a land and I played the stormbreath that was sitting in my hand. Next turn he killed the dragon with murderous cut and I attacked him w/ walker and phoenix. He killed my walker, but the bird got there 2 turns later. g2 he kept a 2 land hand and played his warden, I wild slashed it on my t1 and he didn't have a turn 2 play. I ended up gold fishing this last game quite a bit, he had multiple valorous stances in hand and was also stuck on 3 lands for a couple of turns. 2-0
R8: Temur Monsters. This match irritated me. I was happy to see another temur list at the top tables, but he ran the delve pump spell and killed me w/ it in g3. I was a little salty. Overall, I'm not really dissapointed in losing to him because he was using dorks and bigger dudes. I started with Dorks and bigger dudes but cut to my current build because thoughtsieze is one helluva card. Also I found that going in the mid-game with Abzan was a bad idea in general. I guess he didn't see that many abzan decks though. g1 was close, he started with a dork and i striked it on my turn 2, luckily he didn't have a real play on his turn 2. That set him back a ways, however he eventually found sarkhan and stormbreath off the top while I topdecked 12 lands or something silly like that (I'm still salty). G2 I ran him over with rabblemasters and walkers and striked his rattleclaw mystic. G3 we were both at low life (me 9, him 6) I had stormbreath in play and had the mana to monstrous stormbreath for the win next turn. He attacks with his 6/6 polukranos and i declare no blocks. He starts counting his yard and i see the writing on the wall. I ask him abruptly: "You don't actually run Become immense do you?" and just like that I was out of the running for top 8. Freaking Become immense... To be fair, he could have top decked any burn and I would have been dead as well. But the fact that he killed me w/ janky become immense really rustled my jimmys.
Overall, I had some fun, I also came to the conclusion that I was not happy running temur. RW saw a ton of play and if I had run into it I would have been completely reliant on an .80$ bulk rare. I like my sb list, and I like having the 3 bows, but not playing white in your 3 color aggro deck seems sub par to me. All day I just wanted to cast a sorin or whip or better yet Dissolve. I will continue to throttle people at FNM with this list (I am fairly confident in saying this 75 is within 5 cards of being optimal for the metagame I expect) and after a week or two I'll use my winnings to build a different deck.
tldr; cut a shaman, add another cheap threat, too reliant on bow in RW MU and the list is a pub stomper.
So there hasn´t been much talk lately about the deck i feel. Is it probably not good enough to be running? I mean, i think it´s still really good, but since it hasn´t been popping up anywhere, i kind of had my doubts.
Still, the fact that it´s a R/G agro deck that´s running U for 4 resilient beaters, and a tonne of cheap counterspells, makes it so good against control decks it´s not even funny. On friday i was playing against control and was stuck on 3 lands, thinking about how i would crush the deck with the sideboard i had for it, and i didn´t even lose that game, he played an ugin with me stuck on 3 lands i still won (he was at 8 so my shaman and hasty knuckleblade delt pretty well with him).
For these and for other reasons, i´ve decided to play this deck at the ptq next weekend. But i do however have a dilema. Recently i switched from polukranos, stormbreath build, to basically a frost walker without flamewake phoenix build to see how it went. As arkaniss said, frost walker is the card we needed to be able to fight back against abzan agro (Before, they were playing 2 mana 3/3´s and we were playing 2 mana 2/1´s and 2/2´s. This card can give us a fighting chance against that deck in the early turns, which is great) but it´s real bad against tokens, (like... real bad), and i´m expecting the following decks to appear at the ptq:
-UX control
-R/G agro
-Abzan (all varieties i guess mostly agro)
-Mardu
-Constellation (either with whip or without)
-Boros agro
So i kind of liked the deck with frost walkers, but i also only played with it for one weekend. The sideboard was changed pretty heavily, i had to swap the anger of the gods for arc lightnings, since i was now playing more agro (still i liked the arcs). I took out 2 back to nature (probably a mistake) and i also switched 1 hunt the hunter for a savage punch since i had gone -3 polukranos -2 boon satyr and gone +4 frost walker. Still i had no clue how to sideboard with it.
Lists with frost walkers and flamewake are the lists that have been doing best lately, so maybe i should hop on the train this time around ( although the deck is playing without polukranos which actually stopped rhinos, and with almost no copies of stormbreath, which also stopped rhinos and other storbreaths, and that has me rather disturbed). Personally i think it taxes the mana a lot. Having to have U turn 2 and RR for turn 3 is pretty complicated i think. Are flamewakes good enough?
Regardless, i want to try to find the best sideboard possible against that meta. This is also really tough to do, not so much because of the meta, but because there is no one, best, defined temur agro list, and this also changes with every change of the main deck.
If we´re under the assumption that control is our best matchup, which it is, i think maybe the surrak dragonclaw and temur charms could be removed. What where you guys bringing the charms in against? Where surrak just for control decks? I remember seeing a list somewhere that did well in a daily that had 4 disdainful strokes and 3 surraks in the side. Maybe in place of surrak (or any other control sideboard card) you could consider monastery siege. Siege is a card you definitely don´t want as a 1 of, but maybe as a 2 of it´s good. It serves as the "sideboard slot" against control (both modes are great) but it can also come in against mardu and maybe burn? It gives the sideboard more flexibility I mean, thoughtseize costs 3, downfall costs 5, lightning strike costs 4, too bad crackling doom does´t target :/ still descent i think, i´m going to try it out, it´s like having "more cards" in a single sideboard slot.
Also, against mardu, i always had the issue of "do i bring in back to nature against their 4 chained to the rocks?" and i never did. Maybe reclamation sage is better. Still a 2/1, breaks the chained to the rocks, but is also pretty good against whip decks and i´d actually bring it in against control just to break prerilous vaults.
Against the agro decks, could feed the clan or winds of qal sisma even be considered? they´r the types of cards that could swing a game around, almost useless by themselves, but they have some potential right?
What do you guys think of something like the following against that meta?
Have we reached a somewhat general consensus of what cards are bad against what matchup? I still agree that against R/W and R/G -4 frost walkers is almost a given.
How have people been dealing with the likes of polukranos and siege rhinos now a days?
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While Frost Walker is pretty good against control (high power, low cmc, sorta' annoying to waste removal on it) it's so bad against any aggro deck I'm inclined to avoid playing it. Like RG beats, Temur suffers from the "good when outtempoing opponent, a trainwreck when not". Frost Walker probably helps big Abzan and UB control.
When I was playing with Temur Charm, I noticed some stuff. The lower to the ground you are, the better the card gets. So you 3 cmc and less guys, you might want to try and give the card another go in your maindeck.
When I was playing with Temur Charm, I noticed some stuff. The lower to the ground you are, the better the card gets. So you 3 cmc and less guys, you might want to try and give the card another go in your maindeck.
i hadn´t actually thought about that... i don´t know why. I just thought i should take it out since most decks cut it out completely. But that actually makes sense. I´ll reevaluate
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So there hasn´t been much talk lately about the deck i feel. Is it probably not good enough to be running? I mean, i think it´s still really good, but since it hasn´t been popping up anywhere, i kind of had my doubts.
Still, the fact that it´s a R/G agro deck that´s running U for 4 resilient beaters, and a tonne of cheap counterspells, makes it so good against control decks it´s not even funny. On friday i was playing against control and was stuck on 3 lands, thinking about how i would crush the deck with the sideboard i had for it, and i didn´t even lose that game, he played an ugin with me stuck on 3 lands i still won (he was at 8 so my shaman and hasty knuckleblade delt pretty well with him).
For these and for other reasons, i´ve decided to play this deck at the ptq next weekend. But i do however have a dilema. Recently i switched from polukranos, stormbreath build, to basically a frost walker without flamewake phoenix build to see how it went. As arkaniss said, frost walker is the card we needed to be able to fight back against abzan agro (Before, they were playing 2 mana 3/3´s and we were playing 2 mana 2/1´s and 2/2´s. This card can give us a fighting chance against that deck in the early turns, which is great) but it´s real bad against tokens, (like... real bad), and i´m expecting the following decks to appear at the ptq:
-UX control
-R/G agro
-Abzan (all varieties i guess mostly agro)
-Mardu
-Constellation (either with whip or without)
-Boros agro
So i kind of liked the deck with frost walkers, but i also only played with it for one weekend. The sideboard was changed pretty heavily, i had to swap the anger of the gods for arc lightnings, since i was now playing more agro (still i liked the arcs). I took out 2 back to nature (probably a mistake) and i also switched 1 hunt the hunter for a savage punch since i had gone -3 polukranos -2 boon satyr and gone +4 frost walker. Still i had no clue how to sideboard with it.
Lists with frost walkers and flamewake are the lists that have been doing best lately, so maybe i should hop on the train this time around ( although the deck is playing without polukranos which actually stopped rhinos, and with almost no copies of stormbreath, which also stopped rhinos and other storbreaths, and that has me rather disturbed). Personally i think it taxes the mana a lot. Having to have U turn 2 and RR for turn 3 is pretty complicated i think. Are flamewakes good enough?
Regardless, i want to try to find the best sideboard possible against that meta. This is also really tough to do, not so much because of the meta, but because there is no one, best, defined temur agro list, and this also changes with every change of the main deck.
If we´re under the assumption that control is our best matchup, which it is, i think maybe the surrak dragonclaw and temur charms could be removed. What where you guys bringing the charms in against? Where surrak just for control decks? I remember seeing a list somewhere that did well in a daily that had 4 disdainful strokes and 3 surraks in the side. Maybe in place of surrak (or any other control sideboard card) you could consider monastery siege. Siege is a card you definitely don´t want as a 1 of, but maybe as a 2 of it´s good. It serves as the "sideboard slot" against control (both modes are great) but it can also come in against mardu and maybe burn? It gives the sideboard more flexibility I mean, thoughtseize costs 3, downfall costs 5, lightning strike costs 4, too bad crackling doom does´t target :/ still descent i think, i´m going to try it out, it´s like having "more cards" in a single sideboard slot.
Also, against mardu, i always had the issue of "do i bring in back to nature against their 4 chained to the rocks?" and i never did. Maybe reclamation sage is better. Still a 2/1, breaks the chained to the rocks, but is also pretty good against whip decks and i´d actually bring it in against control just to break prerilous vaults.
Against the agro decks, could feed the clan or winds of qal sisma even be considered? they´r the types of cards that could swing a game around, almost useless by themselves, but they have some potential right?
What do you guys think of something like the following against that meta?
Have we reached a somewhat general consensus of what cards are bad against what matchup? I still agree that against R/W and R/G -4 frost walkers is almost a given.
How have people been dealing with the likes of polukranos and siege rhinos now a days?
-UX control
-R/G agro
-Abzan (all varieties i guess mostly agro)
-Mardu
-Constellation (either with whip or without)
-Boros agro
Hmm, I don't completely agree with your assessment of the meta atm. RG aggro and Mardu seem to be a low percentage of the field and UW heroic is bigger than both decks. I think that RW aggro is going to take up the largest share of the field, followed by Abzan varients. if we consider the field to be
Abzan
RW
Gx value town
Ux Control
and slightly
UW Heroic
RGx aggro
Mardu
Then we can evaluate cards a little better. I am and will continue to stick by Frost walker and Flamewake phoenix. Frost walker does have a poor mu vs RW (tokens specifically) and you will side them, but they are so good vs other mu's that I feel completely comfortable running 4 mainboard. In my opinion, Flamewake phoenix is one of the cards that gives this deck game. I started with 0 in my list and then tried 2, then quickly went up to 4. the recursion is extremely relevant when almost every creature can bring it back; You can M2 it to block for a turn, in stalled games it will win w/ a shaman in play, alone it will win vs control. I have found that against abzans intense removal suite a lot of the time they will start to overpower us at about 5-8 life total and the phoenix will go the distance. If the walker and the phoenix weren't standard, I would not be playing Temur, in general the deck matches up poorly vs abzan and red based removal, unless you can pack 8 2 drops that go right through caryatid and courser.
Temur Charm is an interesting card and one that I have felt fine maining 2 of. You can get a variety of plays with it and really turn the deck into two or three different things. The main thing that I can say about the charm is that when on the play you go t2 dude, turn 3 knucks, then hold up temur charm and knucks U/G abilities for the rest of the game, it is incredibly hard to lose. So temur charm acts as a big Tempo style effect for the decks that are slower than you. For the decks that are faster, such as RW, the temur charm will be a fight mechanic or on the rare occasion the 3rd ability will come into effect. If Temur charm didn't have mana leak drawback I would consider playing 4. As it is, it is rarely a bad draw and sometimes it is a blowout. Also, if the game is going later, you can use temur charm in response to removal to have your guy eat one of theirs (if they have 3 mana up). That play happens quite a bit more than you'd think.
I don't really like the mystics, I started with dorks and ramping into fatties and just lost to thoughtseize and red based removal and then when everything goes to plan you power out your Polukranos or w/e and they downfall it and you are stuck w/ very little to do. The dorks made the deck seem anemic to me too often. Craters claws has a lot of upside, but when you are on the draw and they remove your guy, it will often sit in your hand waiting to take an entire turn to kill their dude that is beating you to death already. I started at 4 and cut to 3 then 2, I'm fairly happy w/ 2 because of the reach, but I wouldn't play more. I don't like the nest in the board, I decided to go with Bow of nylea for my RW mu's because more often than not the burn was closing games out regardless of how secure the board was. With Bow I can gain a steady 3 life a turn (1 card essentially) and it even has cute interactions with Yasova and Shaman in some instances.
While Frost Walker is pretty good against control (high power, low cmc, sorta' annoying to waste removal on it) it's so bad against any aggro deck I'm inclined to avoid playing it. Like RG beats, Temur suffers from the "good when outtempoing opponent, a trainwreck when not". Frost Walker probably helps big Abzan and UB control.
When I was playing with Temur Charm, I noticed some stuff. The lower to the ground you are, the better the card gets. So you 3 cmc and less guys, you might want to try and give the card another go in your maindeck.
No Frost walker is definitely boarded out vs Raise the alarm/Outburst decks. It helps in Every Other Matchup though, and I find that more important. More often than not RW aggro mu's depend on the coinflip anyways, especially if you are also running Rabblemaster.
Yeah, Temur charm becomes a lot better on the play when you are trying to go for that out tempo play you mentioned.
Tournament Report – January 31st, 2015
Preliminary Pro-Tour Qualifier - Vancouver // Herkimer, NY
Record: 5-2-1
Final Standing: 2nd place
I hadn't played in a competitive Standard event since the release of Fate Reforged, nor had I played in one during the latter few weeks. I'd played in one of the last (actual) PTQs in the area with the 4-Color Soul/Delve deck. I brought both the 4-Color Delve deck and the Temur Monsters deck with me for the event, eventually deciding on Temur because of my familiarity with the archetype, and the plethora of U/B Control lists I was expecting.
Fate Reforged brought a bunch of new cards for Temur: Shaman of the Great Hunt, Yasova Dragonclaw, Wild Slash, and Reality Shift. I had contemplated things like Flamewake Phoenix, Frost Walker, Monastery Siege, and Whisperwood Elemental; but the Phoenix seemed less impressive than my current 3-drops and unable to turn on Ferocious by itself. Frost Walker was a bit too fragile for my tastes. Monastery Siege didn't have enough immediate impact. And Whisperwood Elemental competed with Stormbreath Dragon, Surrak Dragonclaw, and Nissa, Worldwaker for 5-drop spots.
Round 1 vs. Derek P. [UB Control] 2-0 WIN
Getting paired against Derek was both hilarious and unfortunate...for him. I was his worst matchup, and we've played enough games for him to know the matchup inside and out...and that it was basically a freebie for him. When most of my deck reads: "you take 4," then it's hard for a control deck to come back from that. Indeed, when backed up by counter magic like Stubborn Denial and Disdainful Stroke it's almost impossible. Game 2 ended off the back of a timely Surrak Dragonclaw coming down on his end step after he had exhausted all his removal spells.
Round 2 vs. Orren T. [Jeskai Tokens] 2-1 WIN
Jeskai Tokens is one of the deck's hardest matchups. Game 1 was close. With both of us at 2 while he had the last pieces of burn to take me out. I misused Yasova; instead of attacking with her, I should have just continued to steal his creatures and hold her back. Instead he was able to kill her in combat and keep me on the back foot. Game 2 was different. I had compete control. Arc Lightning and Wild Slash were all stars in keeping his board clear. Game 3 was much closer. But those same cards kept me from dying.
Round 3 vs. Jake K. [RW Aggro] 1-2 LOSE
The RW deck shares many cards with Jeskai, so the matchup is equally difficult. I was able to take Game1 pretty handily. Though I stumbled in Game 2. In the clincher, I kept 1 land mull-to-6 and didn't hit the second land until it was way too late.
Round 4 vs. Stephen R. [RW Aggro] 2-1 WIN
I managed to take the last two games of this round. I wasn't able to get my footing in the first though. As with Jeskai Tokens, Wild Slash and Arc Lightning were all stars. And between them and my much larger creatures, I took the last two.
Round 5 vs. Andrew G. [Sultai Control] 1-1-1 ID
After doing some quick math, we both realized we were locked in for Top 8 as long as we drew.
Quarterfinals (Top 8) vs. Andrew G. [Sultai Control] 2-0 WIN
As it always seems to go, I end up playing my draw from the previous round of Swiss I. The Top 8. He was on Sultai Contril. But like UB, these matchups are very easy. I took damage from my fetch and pain lands, and that was it. Everything else was my creatures pushing through.
Semifinals (Top 4) vs. Carlos C. [GR Aggro] 2-0 WIN
It had been quite a while since I'd played a GRx mirror. I was undefeated in Monsters Mirrors lifetime during the RTR-THS era standard, and was hoping to continue my streak through this season too. Game 1 was tough, but I had it in the bag. He was a bit more Aggro-centric than my build, which allowed me to slow down and take a punishing route. The end was a Crater's Claws to the dome. Game 2 was VERY close. He got me down to 2, while I swung to clear his entire board except an elvish mystic and drop him to 1. He drew an Ashcloud Phoenix that I saw revealed off ofCourser of Kruphix. And I was pretty sure I was set. Then he revealed a Chandra, and I thought I was dead; thinking he could cast the Chandra, ping me, and attack for lethal with his elf. His lands, however, betrayed him. One of his 4 lands was a Mana Confluence, and he wouldn't have been able to cast Chandra and attack on the same turn.
Finals vs. Zach M. [RW Aggro] 0-2 LOSE
Zach and I split the prize payout before playing and decided to just play for the invite to the Regional PTQ. I did my best Game 1, and almost had it. But some timely burn put me out of range. By the start of Game 2, I'd been playing for more than 7 hours and was tired. I took a mulligan to 6 and kept a hand with 4 Elvish Mystics and 2 lands...they almost got me there. But in the end it just took me WAY too long to get anything going.
Here are my general sideboard notes for the day, broken down by archetype.
Notes: If they're playing Green, they often end up playing Kiora. In that case it's sometimes right to keep a Wild Slash in as insurance. Elvish Mystics are also notoriously bad Topdecks, so if you're on the draw, you don't mind removing one.
RWx Aggro:
IN: 1x Stubborn Denial, 3x Arc Lightning, 1x AEtherspouts, 1x Reality Shift, (2x Back to Nature) OUT: 3x Boon Satyr, 2x Stormbreath Dragon, 1x Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
Notes: Sometimes it feels right to bring in Back to Nature. It's a solid card when your opponent is casting Chained to the Rocks and Jeskai Ascendency. I'm still not sure if that's the right thing to do though.
Notes: I brought out a lot of 1-ofs because I wasn't quite sure which of them was best/worst in this matchup. The deck runs a lot of 4/2 creatures, so with my opponent playing Magma Jet and Lightning Strike I knew they probably weren't great. There was, of course, the chance that the opponent sided-out those burn spells, but having those out already seemed like a good idea.
Overall I had a great time. The deck performed really well, even if I didn't at times. Would I play this deck again? Absolutely. I'm still King of the Monsters.
Not in the main deck. I was very happy with it overall. I am, however, trying Destructive Revelry in place of Back to Nature, and 2 Hornet Nest instead of Burn Away and Aetherspouts.
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Ok coming from my own experience, the plan "play all my dudes" against mardu is just a mistake. They always have the answer. Unfortunately, the only way to actually beat them is (oh the irony) having more than one creature in play.
The big big problem here, either way, is that the typical sideboard is just a big fat mess against that deck, lets be honest. What are you gonna do? (in my case) Side in anger of the gods and hornet nests to kill their rabbelmasters, and seekers, just to get destroyed by sarkhans and butchers? Do i even bother bringing in back to nature against that stupid chained to the rocks they always have? How do i apply pressure early enough not to die to rabbelmaster but not to early because i´d rather have protection up against crackling doom for this last threat i have left in my hand?
Best card is probably disdainful stroke, and still that´s pretty underwhelming against crackling doom.
A huge thanks to Argetlam and the guys at Hakai studios for this awesome banner
4 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Courser of Kruphix
2 Surrak Dragonclaw
Planeswalkers (10)
2 Chandra, Pyromaster
2 Kiora, the Crashing Wave
2 Nissa, Worldwaker
1 Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
3 Xenagos, the Reveler
3 Anger of the Gods
2 Arc Lightning
1 Dig Through Time
2 Mindswipe
2 Reality Shift
3 Temur Charm
3 Treasure Cruise
4 Forest
4 Frontier Bivouac
4 Mountain
2 Shivan Reef
2 Temple of Mystery
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Yavimaya Coast
Modern : RG Titan Shift RG | RG Revolt Zoo RG | RG Ponza RG | RGW Naya Burn RGW
Legacy : RG Belcher RG
My deviantART; if you're interested in alters, PM me!
2 Forest
3 Frontier Bivouac
2 Mana Confluence
2 Mountain
2 Shivan Reef
2 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Epiphany
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Yavimaya Coast
//Creatures
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
3 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Rattleclaw Mystic
4 Savage Knuckleblade
4 Shaman of the Great Hunt
3 Torrent Elemental
4 Icy Blast
2 Treasure Cruise
4 Wildcall
2 Xenagos, the Reveler
1 Stormbreath Dragon
2 Sarkhan, The Dragonspeaker
3 Back to Nature
3 Crater's Claws
4 Monastery Siege
2 Singing Bell Strike
Match 1: 4 Color Good Stuff
I go elf, rabble, shaman in game 1. Games 2, my opponent resolves Siege Rhinos on turns 4 and 6 (three and five for me since I'm on the draw). Game 3, I'm at 11 and my opponent is at 5 when he pulls off some wild trick involving Ajani, Mentor of Heroes, haste, a token, and Temur Battle Rage, I would have lived but I take one point of damage from a painland pumping Knucks before the battle rage hits. Notably, it feels like this deck can take on Siege Rhino on equal footing. Afterwords, I realize that I screwed up, exiled torrent elemental with a cruise and forgot I could bring him back.
Match 2: Sultai Control
Game 1: elf, rabblemaster, GG. Games ends with me at 18 life. Game 2: Manascrewed and Colorscrewed. My opponents two Deathdealer gets me down to 8 life when I concede so that I stop giving out info by being forced to discard cards. I end the game with a Mountain and a Temple of Epiphany on the table and two manadorks in hand. Game 3: Comes down to the wire. My opponent casts crux of fate with Slumgar on the field, plays Kiora and bubbles my Knucks (that gets bounced once to get around the effect). I drop a 7/7 wildcall to draw off the bubble and draw into Sarkhan. Going into the last round, I'm at six life and my opponent is at two. Would probably have been dead if fear of a hasted crackback hadn't kept the dragon on the defensive.
Match 3: Blue White Control
Game 1: I really don't remember much except that I'm surprised that my opponent is not playing Heroic. Game 2: Two Shaman plus a Rattleclaw Mystic kill my opponent quickly. I get to use Monastery Siege for the first time on dragons mode. Game 3: is a slugfest. I resolved 2 Monastery Sieges on Dragons. My opponent resolves one on Khans, which allows him to loot into countermagic. Game ends with an ultimated Elspeth. I've boarded out the elementals and Icy Blasts. I've got enough creatures to pressure his token, but not get through to elspeth on the ground. My notes show that I go from 19 life, to 7 (4 3/3 flying tokens), to dead. My opponent goes as low as 3 life before a radiant fountain takes him to 5, sealing the deal. I get one last chance to win with all my opponents creatures and mana tapped out, casting a treasure cruise for U with an untapped mystic. I draw three land and die. After the game I find that the nearest Dragon/Sarkhan was ten cards down from the point where I died.
Match 4: Red White Aggro
Game 1: (On the draw) Mana screwed. After mulling a no lander (and shuffling like hell) I keep a one lander with Elvish and Rattleclaw mystics only to have my opponent fry them. My opponents Monastery Swiftspear and Goblin Rabblemaster make short work of me. Game 2: to lower my curve I board out all the 5 drops and bring in 3 Crater's Claws and 2 Singing Bell Strikes. I draw none of these cards in game 2. Doesn't really matter, my opponents deck turns out to be mostly burn (I died to creatures game 1). We're at 7 to 6 life before my opponent drops a Seeker of the Way and pulls the game away. Got into the car kicking myself for not siding in Monastery Siege.
Ok so, upshots I suck at magic. Overall record on games 4-7.
Worst Card of the Day: Xenagos, The Reveler. I think I drew this card in almost every game. He got some work done, but I wish I'd just maindecked Crater's Claws.
Needs to go: Treasure Cruise normally, I found myself casting this card for around 5 mana. I never had a problem casting it (except for countermagic) but always seemed to have UU available. Sorcery speed is just too slow. If there was ever a spell you want to cast on your opponents end step after they've tapped out, this is it. For exiling Torrent Elementals Dig Through Time would be better. If you don't care about the elementals, Jace's Ingenuity or even Shamanic Revelation are better options.
On the fence: Rattleclaw Mystic was helpful when playing against control. I lost a game to him getting killed. Keeping for now, I could just as well have drawn two elvish mystics.
Felt good, not sure it actually was good: Wildcall. Most of the time I found myself casting this for 5 mana. The presence of a 7/7 able to swing for lethal resulted in my only match win. It's a bear, but its also significantly less likely to be dead in your hand. I also think I remember getting this off as a 3/3 and a 4/4 in other games. Casting as a sorcery is useful for fueling delve. Theoretically, creating a creature with a spell makes it harder for control to have the correct countermagic. I wouldn't know, out of six games against control, I only drew this card once. I have to wonder if Boon Satyr or Yasova Dragonclaw wouldn't be better in this slot.
Seemed to work: Icy Blast and Torrent Elemental. I was going to play a R/G deck, and perhaps should have. I goldfished it with the premise of the goldfish always casting either Siege Rhino or Tasigur on turn 4 and asked myself if I could win. Honestly, these cards were really only relevant in one match all day. If I honestly thought that Abzan was dead, I'd say pull them. I suspect I was dealing with a divergent meta with Monastery Siege killing the control and burn decks into the losers bracket. The poor performance my deck put up does not say good things about it, or about the skills of the player.
I never drew Singing Bell Strike nor faced a deck with a good reason to board in Back to Nature.
Some notes: Casting spells with mostly a single colored mana requirement (and double being GG) meant I took surprisingly little land pain. Also, Shamanic Revelation might be worth a second look. The board tends to develop to a state where you have two creatures that trigger ferocious and at least one mana dork on it.
Going forward, I'm thinking of something like this:
2 Forest
3 Frontier Bivouac
2 Mana Confluence
2 Mountain
2 Shivan Reef
2 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Epiphany
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Yavimaya Coast
//Creatures
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
3 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Rattleclaw Mystic
4 Savage Knuckleblade
4 Shaman of the Great Hunt
3 Torrent Elemental
4 Icy Blast
2 Dig Through Time
4 Wildcall
2 Crater's Claws
1 Stormbreath Dragon
2 Sarkhan, The Dragonspeaker
3 Back to Nature
2 Lightning Strike
1 Crater's Claws
4 Monastery Siege
2 Surrak Dragonclaw
I'm torn between burn and Stubborn Denial in the board. I don't want to overreact to the prevalence of control in one meta.
4 Heir of the Wilds
4 Rattleclaw Mystic
4 Savage Knuckleblade
2 Boon Satyr
2 Yasova Dragonclaw
2 Flamewake Phoenix
3 Shaman of the Great Hunt
3 Ashcloud Phoenix
2 Stormbreath Dragon
3 Stubborn Denial
4 Crater's Claws
4 ???
Land: 23
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Frontier Bivouac
3 Shivan Reef
4 Yavimaya Coast
3 Mana Confluence
3 Forest
2 Mountain
2 Reality Shift
2 Magma Spray
1 Stubborn Denial
3 Disdainful Stroke
2 Barrage of Boulders
2 Hornet Nest
1 Surrak Dragonclaw
2 Destructive Revelry
Magma Spray is back because I expect to see Flamewake and Ashcloud Phoenixes running around, and they annoy me.
For the 4 unknown spots, I am thinking about +2 Sylvan Caryatid, +2 Lightning Strike (OR Wild Slash). Seeing more Mantis Riders recently. Temur Charm is also an option; it served me pretty well in the past.
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=79413
It looks like the plan for this deck is to have as high of a density of Ferocious creatures as possible, enabling Flamewake Phoenix reursion and a bunch of burn to close off the game. Blue looks to be in there just for Knuckleblade and sideboard slots.
4x Rattleclaw Mystic
4x Frost Walker
4x Savage Knuckleblade
3x Boon Satyr
2x Shaman of the Great Hunt
3x Whisperwood Elemental
Other Spells(16)
4x Wild Slash
4x Crater's Claw
3x Void Snare
2x Stubborn Denial
3x Temur Charm
4x Frontier Bivouac
1x Evolving Wilds
4x Wooded Foothills
3x Temple of Mystery
1x Temple of Epiphany
1x Temple of Abandon
3x Yavimaya Coast
1x Shivan Reef
3x Mountain
2x Forest
1x Island
3x Anger of the Gods
2x Magma Spray
2x Unravel the Aether
2x Dig Through Time
2x Stubborn Denial
2x Disdainful Stroke
2x Firedrinker Satyr
I also don't think Elvish Mystic is a good choice for this deck. It messes up the mana early, and we don't have any good way of taking advantage of the mana boost turn 2. I agree with the earlier comments about Shaman of the Great Hunt. Sometimes he's amazing, other times he is terrible. I hardly ever activate his ability, but it is nice knowing that it is available. I decided to cut Flamewake Phoenix for now; it is a great card, but it is best in a matchup that is already good for this deck (control decks). The matchups where it is bad (aggro decks) it is awful, and it isn't that great against midrange decks. A card that has been amazing has been Whisperwood Elemental. Against aggro, he shuts down their ability to attack; against control, he is a one man army that can provide boardwipe protection; and against midrange, he allows us to fight the attrition war. He gives this deck a play on turn five that puts us in a position to win. He also allows us to flood on land and not lose the game. By manifesting the top card of our deck, it is almost like drawing a card every turn.
3 Ashcloud Phoenix
3 Elvish Mystic
4 Flamewake Phoenix
4 Frost Walker
4 Rattleclaw Mystic
4 Savage Knuckleblade
3 Shaman of the Great Hunt
3 Boon Satyr
Spells (9)
3 Lightning Strike
2 Wild Slash
4 Crater's Claws
3 Forest
2 Mountain
4 Frontier Bivouac
2 Mana Confluence
3 Shivan Reef
1 Temple of Abandon
1 Temple of Epiphany
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Yavimaya Coast
4 Disdainful Stroke
2 Magma Spray
2 Stubborn Denial
2 Temur Charm
3 Surrak Dragonclaw
2 Barrage of Boulders
Modern : RG Titan Shift RG | RG Revolt Zoo RG | RG Ponza RG | RGW Naya Burn RGW
Legacy : RG Belcher RG
Modern : RG Titan Shift RG | RG Revolt Zoo RG | RG Ponza RG | RGW Naya Burn RGW
Legacy : RG Belcher RG
@RealOG47, why run Frost Walker and whipies in the same deck. They seem to want to do different things, one be aggressive and one sit back and build an army.
@Everyone, has reality shift been that bad for everyone? I've yet to try it but it seems fairly good versus Courser.dec to know what they are getting as a 2/2. It also doesn't seem to bad with our own scrylands to save a creature from death.
-Benjamin "The Innovator" Franklin
Standard:
Nothing, hate standard after Rhino
Modern:
Looking at Evolution Decks, RUG or [mana]WRG[mana]
Legacy:
Shardless Foundry ('Cause I have a crippling addiction to Shardless Agent) BUG (and I'm to broke for goyfs)
EDH:
RGUSurrak Dragon Tribal!RGU
URArjun StormUR
GUEzuri TokensGU
GRBUYidris GoodstuffGRBU
We have limited ways to deal with x/4+'s outside of crater's claws, reality shift is a good way to do that. We can easily beat a 2/2 in combat, and about 60-80% of the time they will not get a creature, or at least a creature worth flipping over. It also gives us a way to kill ashcloud phoenix, and mid-late game deathdealers.
Here's the list that I've been running recently. I 3-1ed the last mtgo daily I played, lost to r/w heroic (they get turn 3 kills!).
4 frontier bivouac
4 temple of mystery
2 temple of epiphany
3 shivan reef
2 yavimaya coast
4 wooded foothills
2 mountain
3 forest
Creatures: 21
4 frost walker
4 heir of the wilds
4 boon satyr
4 savage knuckleblade
2 shaman of the great hunt
3 ashcloud phoenix
4 stubborn denial
4 crater's claws
2 force away
4 lightning strike
1 treasure cruise
3 magma spray
3 back to nature
3 disdainful stroke
2 reality shift
3 barrage of boulders
1 treasure cruise
I played flamewake phoenix for awhile, but I don't like it. The deck (at least my version) seems to shift roles a bit, and flamewake does nothing on defense. It's good against control decks and controlling midrange decks, but we are already really good against those decks because we play 4 copies of a 1 cmc counterspell, and we have access to card-draw. I think boon satyr is far better in that spot. Not only does boon satyr have flash and trigger ferocious, but the bestow lets our guys trade with rhinos as well as act as a pseudo counter against damage and toughness based removal. It's far more flexible than the phoenix is.
The only thing I'm not 100% sold on in my deck is whether I should be running a maindeck treasure cruise or the 3rd shaman. Sometimes I can't cast cruise when I need to, but when I do it's ridiculous. Like-wise, the shaman is at a weird spot on the curve, and I find that you don't want a lot of 4+ drops, since you want to hold up counter magic too, but when he can get in a hit or draw cards, he's the best card in our 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
I'm running Whisperwood mainly because it is an outstanding card at stabilizing a board state vs aggro, and it is a one-man army vs midrange and control. The problem we face is that we have a lot of cards that help us kill our opponent fast, but we are bad vs decks that are as fast or faster than us. Against those decks, Whisperwood shuts down their aggression. Against the decks we are faster than, he makes essentially a 2/2 token every turn, which is great in conjunction with Shaman of the Great Hunt. So, overall my deck is very aggressive with Frost Walker, but it has the ability to go into the midgame when necessary.
The problem with Reality Shift is that a lot of our creatures have 2 or less toughness, so it will usually be a 2 for 1 against. Bounce and burn has worked for me, with additional utility out of Temur Charm.
Edit: One more point on Whisperwood Elemental. One thing I've noticed with this deck is that it is usually very good when ahead and very bad when behind. Whisperwood is one of the few cards that we have available to us that is okay when ahead, but very good when behind or at parity. That I think is the best thing it has going for it.
I also have two slots that I'm going to be freeing up. I'm going to 3x Wild Slash and 2x Temur Charm. I was thinking I might want a high impact card for those last two slots. I am currently trying to decide between Xenagos, the Reveler; Chandra Pyromaster; Jace, the Living Guildpact; or Yasova Dragonclaw. I like Jace as a tempo play and a way of continually drawing gas; Xenagos is great with both Shaman of the Great Hunt and Whisperwood; Chandra is a solid card; and Yasova is good as a three drop that helps beat face. Any opinions?
4 frontier bivouac
2 temple of abandon
1 temple of epiphany
3 shivan reef
4 Yavimaya coast
4 Wooded foothills
1 Mana confluence
2 mountain
3 forest
Creatures: 27
4 Elvish Mystic
3 Rattleclaw Mystic
3 heir of the wilds
3 boon satyr
4 savage knuckleblade
3 shaman of the great hunt
4 Flamewake Pheonix
3 Stormbreath Dragon
2 stubborn denial
3 crater's claws
1 Temur Charm
3 lightning strike
2 magma spray
2 Destructive Revelry
1 Surrak Dragonclaw
2 Force Away
1 Stubborn Denial
2 Hornet Nest
2 Temur Charm
3 Anger the gods
Game 1: Mono Red Sligh 2-1 (1-0)
Game 2: Sultai Control 2-0 (2-0)
Game 3: Jeskai Ascendency Combo 1-2 (2-1) - Just barely lost this one. If I had countered a DTT instead of holding the counter for jeskai ascendency I would have won it.
Game 4: Naya Mid-range 2-0 (3-1)
Synopsis: The deck has been great. It's fast and puts a lot of pressure on the opponent early. The amount of flyer keeps the attacks versatile and lets me get past big stuff on the ground. Boon Satyr is a house, especially with Flamewake Pheonix. I really like this build as far as the creatures go. My biggest questions now are Sb and the spells I'm running in the MB. I've also been toying with the idea of frost walk in heir of the wild's spot but am not sure.
Thoughts?
Thanks to DNC at Heroes of the Plane for this sig
Now Playing:
EDH:
Derevi, Enchantress
5C Planeswalkers (Child of Alara)
Sharuum
Narset, Enlightened Master
Ezuri Elves
The Mimeoplasm
4 Frontier Bivouac
3 Temple of Abandon
1 temple of Epiphany
3 Shivan Reef
4 Yavimaya Coast
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Mountain
2 Forest
1 Mana Confluence
Creatures: 27
4 Frost Walker
4 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Yasova Dragonclaw
4 savage knuckleblade
2 shaman of the great hunt
4 Ashcloud Phoenix
2 Polukranos, World Eater
4 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Whisperwood Elemental
2 Xenagos, the Reveler
Enchantments-1
1 Temur Ascendancy
Spells: 6
2 Stubborn Denial
1 Temur Battle Rage
3 Crater's Claws
3 Anger of the Gods
2 Arc Lightning
1 Destructive Revelry
1 Keranos, God of Storms
1 Nissa, Worldwaker
2 Reality Shift
1 Surrak Dragonclaw
2 Temur Ascendancy
I went 3-0-1 last night with this playing against GR ramp, Jeskai Tokens, and Sidisi whip (I ID'd the last round). I've been really impressed with Frost Walker (the reason i beat whip game one). The game one against aggro can be rough, hence the angers/arc lightning count in the board. The ascendancy is bonkers against slower midrange decks and control variants because they won't usually have an answer for it and you can just card advantage them into oblivion (especially when everything I do against them post-board is a must answer). I plan on sticking with and tweaking this deck for a little while, so any suggestions are more than welcome.
On reality shift, I have found it very good because in the post games against decks i want it against, I tend to board out some number of X/2's anyway (like shaman), so the makes the 2/2 I give them less of an issue. Got to go to christmasland last night, reality shifting a stormbreath and manifesting an Ugin (which he had the mana for). My opponent was not happy.
Preliminary Pro-Tour Qualifier - Vancouver // Herkimer, NY
Record: 5-2-1
Final Standing: 2nd place
I hadn't played in a competitive Standard event since the release of Fate Reforged, nor had I played in one during the latter few weeks. I'd played in one of the last (actual) PTQs in the area with the 4-Color Soul/Delve deck. I brought both the 4-Color Delve deck and the Temur Monsters deck with me for the event, eventually deciding on Temur because of my familiarity with the archetype, and the plethora of U/B Control lists I was expecting.
Fate Reforged brought a bunch of new cards for Temur: Shaman of the Great Hunt, Yasova Dragonclaw, Wild Slash, and Reality Shift. I had contemplated things like Flamewake Phoenix, Frost Walker, Monastery Siege, and Whisperwood Elemental; but the Phoenix seemed less impressive than my current 3-drops and unable to turn on Ferocious by itself. Frost Walker was a bit too fragile for my tastes. Monastery Siege didn't have enough immediate impact. And Whisperwood Elemental competed with Stormbreath Dragon, Surrak Dragonclaw, and Nissa, Worldwaker for 5-drop spots.
I went with Derek, a friend and coworker from TCGplayer.com, and played the following list to a 2nd place finish: Temur Dragonclaws, Monsters of the Great Hunt
Here are my general sideboard notes for the day, broken down by archetype.
UBx Control: Notes: If they're playing Green, they often end up playing Kiora. In that case it's sometimes right to keep a Wild Slash in as insurance. Elvish Mystics are also notoriously bad Topdecks, so if you're on the draw, you don't mind removing one.
RWx Aggro: Notes: Sometimes it feels right to bring in Back to Nature. It's a solid card when your opponent is casting Chained to the Rocks and Jeskai Ascendency. I'm still not sure if that's the right thing to do though.
GRx Aggro: Notes: I brought out a lot of 1-ofs because I wasn't quite sure which of them was best/worst in this matchup. The deck runs a lot of 4/2 creatures, so with my opponent playing Magma Jet and Lightning Strike I knew they probably weren't great. There was, of course, the chance that the opponent sided-out those burn spells, but having those out already seemed like a good idea.
Overall I had a great time. The deck performed really well, even if I didn't at times. Would I play this deck again? Absolutely. I'm still King of the Monsters.
Star city games Regional Qualifiers in Portland, Oregon.
Name: Nick/Arkaniss
Record: 5-2-1 27th place out of 200
Deck Temur:
4 Savage knuckleblade
4 frost walker
4 heir of the wilds
4 shaman of the great hunt
4 flamewake phoenix
3 Goblin Rabblemaster
2 Stormbreath Dragon
2 Yasova dragonclaw
1 Boon Satyr
Non-Creatures
3 Lightning strike
2 Temur Charm
2 Disdainful stroke
2 Crater's claws
4 Frontier bivouac
4 wooded foothills
4 shivan reef
3 yavimaya coast
3 Mountain
3 Forest
1 temple of abandon
1 temple of epiphany
1 temple of mystery
2 nissa, worldwaker
1 surrak dragonclaw
1 keranos, god of storms
2 negate
1 disdainful stroke
1 lightning strike
1 wild slash
1 arc lightning
2 anger of the gods
3 bow of nylea
Changes I would make
-1 Shaman of the great hunt
+1 ???
Shaman was a great draw into an open board, and in general he was really nice to have. I think the 4th shaman is too greedy on the mana base and I would swap him out for a smaller creature, I'm not sure what though. I think this deck was a poor choice for the meta I expected, the main reason I didn't sleeve another 75 is due to time constraints. That being said I am fairly comfortable with this deck and could have won the event. The worst mu for my list is RW aggro, especially token based strategies + burn. The morning of the event I decided to drop the 4th sb stroke for the 3rd Bow and I don't regret it at all. Bow is such a house against the decks where you want it, the legendary status sucks to be sure, but if you have one of these in play you should be winning.
Sb plans:
I built the deck to have a good g1 mu vs Abzan (all variants), control and be reasonable vs gb strategies, UW Heroic and RW/Mardu. I think that the worst g1 mu is going to be RW followed by heroic.
RW: -2 disdainful stroke, -4 frost walker, -2 flamewake phoenix, on the draw -1 rabblemaster +3 bow of nylea +1 lightning strike +1 arc lightning +1 wild slash +2 anger of the gods on the draw +1 keranos
Here their tokens match up really well with your walkers, you don't mind trading 1 for 1 with them (ever) but when their raise the alarm gets a walker + dude it kinda sucks. For that reason, in the game I will typically sit on my walkers until they have something I want to block and try and trade them up for removal or rabbles or w/e. the flamewake phoenix is a house against any opponent looking to grind, but vs RW they just want to end it, m2 flamewake is an incredibly common play. On the draw your rabbles don't match up to theirs (1 turn late ofc) so I typically like to take some out. If they are light on tokens, I will keep the walkers in over the rabbles. Bow of nylea has a lot of power in these mu's where they are trading 1 card for 3 dmg, being able to put your guys out of burn range is nice too. the rest don't need explanation
Control: the variants of control are typically UBx, UW and you could consider some abzan decks "Control"; -3 lightning strike -4 heir of the wilds +1 disdainful stroke +1 keranos +2 nissa +2 negate + 1 Surrak (U based). G1 is almost always a free win, every creature sans the heir is a true threat to them and most of them bring back Flamewake, making it impossible for them to gain control on board wipes. I have never lost vs control in a Bo3, all you ahve to do is play flamewake phoenix and then a creature that triggers his ferocious and attack him until he is dead. Most of the time by about turn 12-15 my opponent is asking how many cards in hand "5~" and they are flabbergasted. Their is not enough removal in their deck to handle 4 flamewakes and 24 other creatures. You have to with hold the grin when they blight your flamewakes, in their head they think your only play is two 2/2's, but your sitting on 3 4/4's just waiting to murder them every single turn. Our most relevant creatures have haste and I kept 1 boon satyr in to give control fits. He also helps with Yasova and finishing games with the phoenix (but w/e).
UW Heroic: -2 disdainful strokes +1 wild slash +1 lightning strike. This is one of the other decks I have sleeved and I have won multiple FNMS and win-a-box events with it. I know the mu pretty well and it just becomes a race, if the UW heroic is running 4 ordeal of heliods, they are favored, if they are running the heliod's pilgrim suite, you have a really good chance of racing them. I used to have a lot more dedicated sb slots for this mu, but since I didn't think it was going to show well I planned for other decks. As I said, I wasn't expecting this deck to make a large appearance and it barely showed. We will see if this wax in UW heroic is permanent, I think that Grandmaster makes racing WR(u) hard and that was/is a prevalent MU. I didn't face this deck in the tournament and it didn't top 8, I was "Prepared" though.
Abzan: -3 lightning strike +1 disdainful stroke +2 nissa on play, on Draw -2 rabblemaster +1 keranos +1 strike. I Wanted to have a good mu vs this deck in g1 because I felt that whoever won the die roll was probably going to win this. For that I added 2 Dstrokes to the mb and had 1 in the side. I think that Siege rhino is blatanly overpowered and every time I see him w/ a courser I watch the win % in my head drop like a brick. This mu was also the main reason why I went to 4 heirs mb. Previously I was running 1 ashcloud phoenix, 1 polukranos and 2 stubborns main in their place. I found that those 4 helped my already absurd control MU and the heirs dngaf about abzans creatures. Flamewakes are also incredibly important here because they will get in for a good chunk of dmg well before the roc's come out. if the roc's come out in pairs, you have probably lost, but, if in g1 you can fight through them with either strikes + recursion or shaman pumps. Speaking of shaman, this deck is chock full of stuff that Abzan has to tap out to deal with, this means that if you sequence it right, you will almost always get a hit in with a shaman, and then their rhinos simply trade (something I'm okay with). Knucks is the nuts in this mu because he can simply run over everything they do and requires immediate attention. There are going to be games where they draw 4 pieces of removal, gain 10 life off of courser and drop 3 rhinos... No one is winning that, especially not the aggro deck w/ no lifegain. Sorin can also be a problem for you, he isn't bad when they have to make a vamp, but when he can give 12+ point life swings, you start thinking about the next game. i would say that if the Temur plays first it's about 70% win ratio. if the Abzan goes first it's about 65% win ratio... That's about as close as this deck gets to beating rhinos g1. post board g2 you can simply out tempo them with turn 3 w/e into t4 stroke/charm. you can diversify your threats with nissa and keranos as well. overall I think post board games get a little better and the w/l ratio on the draw is about 40%
Mardu: overall I think mardu won't produce enough removal to kill all of your guys and their plan is pretty weak to your removal. I would say that this should be a favorable mu overall. I don't have that much experience with it though.
GB devotion/whip: if they can play a whip and do something else that turn, you have probably lost. If they don't get that privilege then you win. I would consider this a fairly favorable MU. Not as favorable as U based control decks, but a lot closer to that end of hte equilibrium than RW. -1 strike +1 stroke
Onto the Report
R1: Sultai Control. I was paired with a Vancouver local playing Sultai control. G1 I started with flamewake, knucks, couple of lands and a strike. I didn't know his list but put him on Abzan when he played the GB Scry land. fortunately the first 2nd lands I played were bivouac and Temple of Ab so I was able to change over to Flamewake on turn 3. I drew into another flamewake, he blighted both and I passed turn. turn 5 I played a knucks, gave him haste and resurrected the phoenix, hitting him for 6. He played vault and I hit him for 6 again, I didn't bring back the 2nd phoenix since I had shaman in hand. He popped vault when I declared attacks, on his turn he played land and passed back. I showed him the shaman on my next main phase and it was off to game two. In game two I boarded in two nissas and he boarded in tasigur and deathdealer to block with. I ended up losing game two to a huge mistake, I thought that his life total was 6 and after hitting him with phoenix and stormbreath the previous turn. he was holding onto lands, but I sensed he was in topdeck mode for removal and had the nissa in hand. I played the nissa, made a 4/4 and attacked with the lethal team, he Hero's D'd my stormbreath and looked at me expecting some sort of burn, I didn't realize that he was at 8 life... he won on the crack back. I could have animated the land and just swung in w/ the phoenix. if he had the removal, I would have been able to dbl block and then make another 4/4 the next turn. Unfortunately I had life totals wrong. G3 I slaughtered him, unfortunately I don't remember the details. 2-1
R2: 1-1-1 RW Grandmaster burn. R2 I plaed against another Vancouver local, this time it was a guy that I had been playtesting for the previous two hours against. We knew that the mu was a coin toss and decided to hedge and draw. We played for fun though and it was extremely close. I'm glad I took the draw, the final game didn't finish but it was very even. Draw
R3: Abzan aggro. This match was a little frustrating for my opponent. I won the dye roll and proceeded to t2 frost walker t3 rabble (he BB'd it) t4 shaman, he was playing catch up for 3 or so turns while stuck at 3 mana. At first consideration, being stuck at 3 mana really sucks, but in hindsight he drew nothing but removal. I won g1 in sordid fashion but I felt bad he was mana screwed. I didn't get to see that many creatures in G1, but I did see a deathdealer, which tells me aggro variant. I sided in my 4th strike and the stroke and took out two rabbles. G2 I striked his turn 2 play and then played Knucks on t3, turn 4-6 I held open to counter his plays with my 2 temur charms and 1 stroke. Knucks went most of the way and then shaman got down for the final atk of 8 points. 2-0
R4: GB whip. This was the 3rd Vancouver player I played against (less than 10/200 and I play 5). I didn't know what list he was running before the tournament, but he went to time in round 3 so I was able to watch some of his games. G1 i kept a hand w/ knucks and frost walker plus strike and lands, he thoughtsiezed the walker and killed the knucks, I got kinda flooded and the game took about 20 mins but he eventually won. G2 i overwhelmed him wit rabbles into shaman, just playing tap out aggro until he died. G3 was similar except i sided the rabblemasters for nissas and Keranos. he played 4 satyrs and a couple of coursers but in the end I was able to kill him with a 6/6 phoenix that I boon satyr'd for GG. 2-1
R5: Sultai control. This round was 2-0, I don't even remember the details, the only thing that I remember is charm fighting his tasigur g1 w/ knucks and then charm countering it g2 as knucks and frost walker beat him to death. 2-0
R6: Mardu good stuff w/ the guy that got 2nd. This was my 4th pairing vs a Vancouver local and the one that I didn't really care to play. I wasn't sure what list he was on because he had been piloting a couple different decks in the week prior, but he is a solid player. G1 he won the dye roll, we both played draw go until turn 3 when I started with Walker into phoenix, trying to force his crackling doom. he played around it a bit and eventually crackled my knucks. The next turn he played Stormbreath and put me to 14. I replied with a savage knuckleblade and swung back, putting him to 11. He played the phoenix and got in for 6, I got in w/ knuck and put him to 7, then m2 phoenix. He connected with his phoenix and I blocked the stormbreath, putting me to 6 and him at 7. At this point I was in top deck mode and so was he, going into my turn he had 1 card in hand that he topped. I knew that if he had removal in hand I was dead anyways since I couldn't block w/ phoenix anymore and he would just kill my potential blocker and swing w/ stormy. I was all in on my draw. It was a stormbreath...
I cast the stormbreath and saw the sullen look on his face, I swung in w/ the team for the lethal blow. Since he was at 7 I couldn't just hit with 2 and win, I had to get in with both dragon and knucks. Giving him another draw with 15 or so removal spells seems like a bad idea. As I finished declaring attackers and went to dmg phase, preparing to go to g2 he taped RWB and cast crackling doom. Off to g2. in game 2 I rolled him over with heir and walker then shaman into shaman. it was quick and we moved to g3. for g3 i sided out my rabbles, since I expected him to side them back in, and he did. He got the trip rabble hand and I didn't see enough removal or Anger. Loss 1-2 If I had won this match, I was all but guaranteed to hit top 8. Being 5-0-1 in an 8 round tournament is a good place to be.
R7: Abzan Aggro. This was the final Vancouver opponent I faced and it was fairly quick. He won the dye roll and started w/ a t1 Warden of the first tree. his t2 play was a cipt land so he only got in for 1 dmg. I kept mana open on my turn 2 to strike his guy in response to pumps, but he never pumped. I took the 1 and when he passed I striked, he responded with Val Stance. I shrugged and untapped and striked it again. he played a lion on t3 and I responded with an heir, I was happy when he offered the trade, and the follow up rhino was fine as well. I played knuck and passed back. he got in for 4 (11 or so) and passed turn, I played Shaman and he killed knucks then blighted shaman. I drew a frost walker to compliment my craters claws and killed his rhino. He top decked a land and I played the stormbreath that was sitting in my hand. Next turn he killed the dragon with murderous cut and I attacked him w/ walker and phoenix. He killed my walker, but the bird got there 2 turns later. g2 he kept a 2 land hand and played his warden, I wild slashed it on my t1 and he didn't have a turn 2 play. I ended up gold fishing this last game quite a bit, he had multiple valorous stances in hand and was also stuck on 3 lands for a couple of turns. 2-0
R8: Temur Monsters. This match irritated me. I was happy to see another temur list at the top tables, but he ran the delve pump spell and killed me w/ it in g3. I was a little salty. Overall, I'm not really dissapointed in losing to him because he was using dorks and bigger dudes. I started with Dorks and bigger dudes but cut to my current build because thoughtsieze is one helluva card. Also I found that going in the mid-game with Abzan was a bad idea in general. I guess he didn't see that many abzan decks though. g1 was close, he started with a dork and i striked it on my turn 2, luckily he didn't have a real play on his turn 2. That set him back a ways, however he eventually found sarkhan and stormbreath off the top while I topdecked 12 lands or something silly like that (I'm still salty). G2 I ran him over with rabblemasters and walkers and striked his rattleclaw mystic. G3 we were both at low life (me 9, him 6) I had stormbreath in play and had the mana to monstrous stormbreath for the win next turn. He attacks with his 6/6 polukranos and i declare no blocks. He starts counting his yard and i see the writing on the wall. I ask him abruptly: "You don't actually run Become immense do you?" and just like that I was out of the running for top 8. Freaking Become immense... To be fair, he could have top decked any burn and I would have been dead as well. But the fact that he killed me w/ janky become immense really rustled my jimmys.
Overall, I had some fun, I also came to the conclusion that I was not happy running temur. RW saw a ton of play and if I had run into it I would have been completely reliant on an .80$ bulk rare. I like my sb list, and I like having the 3 bows, but not playing white in your 3 color aggro deck seems sub par to me. All day I just wanted to cast a sorin or whip or better yet Dissolve. I will continue to throttle people at FNM with this list (I am fairly confident in saying this 75 is within 5 cards of being optimal for the metagame I expect) and after a week or two I'll use my winnings to build a different deck.
tldr; cut a shaman, add another cheap threat, too reliant on bow in RW MU and the list is a pub stomper.
So there hasn´t been much talk lately about the deck i feel. Is it probably not good enough to be running? I mean, i think it´s still really good, but since it hasn´t been popping up anywhere, i kind of had my doubts.
Still, the fact that it´s a R/G agro deck that´s running U for 4 resilient beaters, and a tonne of cheap counterspells, makes it so good against control decks it´s not even funny. On friday i was playing against control and was stuck on 3 lands, thinking about how i would crush the deck with the sideboard i had for it, and i didn´t even lose that game, he played an ugin with me stuck on 3 lands i still won (he was at 8 so my shaman and hasty knuckleblade delt pretty well with him).
For these and for other reasons, i´ve decided to play this deck at the ptq next weekend. But i do however have a dilema. Recently i switched from polukranos, stormbreath build, to basically a frost walker without flamewake phoenix build to see how it went. As arkaniss said, frost walker is the card we needed to be able to fight back against abzan agro (Before, they were playing 2 mana 3/3´s and we were playing 2 mana 2/1´s and 2/2´s. This card can give us a fighting chance against that deck in the early turns, which is great) but it´s real bad against tokens, (like... real bad), and i´m expecting the following decks to appear at the ptq:
-UX control
-R/G agro
-Abzan (all varieties i guess mostly agro)
-Mardu
-Constellation (either with whip or without)
-Boros agro
My list as of right now:
4 Savage knuckleblade
4 frost walker
4 heir of the wilds
4 shaman of the great hunt
2 Yasova dragonclaw
4 Rattleclaw Mystic
3 Ashcloud Phoenix
Non-Creatures
3 Wild slash
4 Stubborn denial
4 Crater's claws
4 Frontier bivouac
4 wooded foothills
2 shivan reef
4 yavimaya coast
3 Mountain
3 Forest
2 temple of abandon
2 temple of mystery
2 surrak dragonclaw
3 disdainful stroke
3 arc lightning
2 Hunt the hunter
1 Savage punch
2 Hornet nest
2 Temur charm
So i kind of liked the deck with frost walkers, but i also only played with it for one weekend. The sideboard was changed pretty heavily, i had to swap the anger of the gods for arc lightnings, since i was now playing more agro (still i liked the arcs). I took out 2 back to nature (probably a mistake) and i also switched 1 hunt the hunter for a savage punch since i had gone -3 polukranos -2 boon satyr and gone +4 frost walker. Still i had no clue how to sideboard with it.
Lists with frost walkers and flamewake are the lists that have been doing best lately, so maybe i should hop on the train this time around ( although the deck is playing without polukranos which actually stopped rhinos, and with almost no copies of stormbreath, which also stopped rhinos and other storbreaths, and that has me rather disturbed). Personally i think it taxes the mana a lot. Having to have U turn 2 and RR for turn 3 is pretty complicated i think. Are flamewakes good enough?
Regardless, i want to try to find the best sideboard possible against that meta. This is also really tough to do, not so much because of the meta, but because there is no one, best, defined temur agro list, and this also changes with every change of the main deck.
If we´re under the assumption that control is our best matchup, which it is, i think maybe the surrak dragonclaw and temur charms could be removed. What where you guys bringing the charms in against? Where surrak just for control decks? I remember seeing a list somewhere that did well in a daily that had 4 disdainful strokes and 3 surraks in the side. Maybe in place of surrak (or any other control sideboard card) you could consider monastery siege. Siege is a card you definitely don´t want as a 1 of, but maybe as a 2 of it´s good. It serves as the "sideboard slot" against control (both modes are great) but it can also come in against mardu and maybe burn? It gives the sideboard more flexibility I mean, thoughtseize costs 3, downfall costs 5, lightning strike costs 4, too bad crackling doom does´t target :/ still descent i think, i´m going to try it out, it´s like having "more cards" in a single sideboard slot.
Also, against mardu, i always had the issue of "do i bring in back to nature against their 4 chained to the rocks?" and i never did. Maybe reclamation sage is better. Still a 2/1, breaks the chained to the rocks, but is also pretty good against whip decks and i´d actually bring it in against control just to break prerilous vaults.
Against the agro decks, could feed the clan or winds of qal sisma even be considered? they´r the types of cards that could swing a game around, almost useless by themselves, but they have some potential right?
What do you guys think of something like the following against that meta?
3 Disdainful stroke
2 Hornet nest
2 Monastery siege
2 Reclamation sage
3 Arc lightning / barrage of boulders
2 Hunt the hunter
1 somthing
Have we reached a somewhat general consensus of what cards are bad against what matchup? I still agree that against R/W and R/G -4 frost walkers is almost a given.
How have people been dealing with the likes of polukranos and siege rhinos now a days?
A huge thanks to Argetlam and the guys at Hakai studios for this awesome banner
Does Frost Walker help against any aggro deck running Hordeling Outburst? I think not.
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When I was playing with Temur Charm, I noticed some stuff. The lower to the ground you are, the better the card gets. So you 3 cmc and less guys, you might want to try and give the card another go in your maindeck.
i hadn´t actually thought about that... i don´t know why. I just thought i should take it out since most decks cut it out completely. But that actually makes sense. I´ll reevaluate
A huge thanks to Argetlam and the guys at Hakai studios for this awesome banner
-R/G agro
-Abzan (all varieties i guess mostly agro)
-Mardu
-Constellation (either with whip or without)
-Boros agro
Hmm, I don't completely agree with your assessment of the meta atm. RG aggro and Mardu seem to be a low percentage of the field and UW heroic is bigger than both decks. I think that RW aggro is going to take up the largest share of the field, followed by Abzan varients. if we consider the field to be
Abzan
RW
Gx value town
Ux Control
and slightly
UW Heroic
RGx aggro
Mardu
Then we can evaluate cards a little better. I am and will continue to stick by Frost walker and Flamewake phoenix. Frost walker does have a poor mu vs RW (tokens specifically) and you will side them, but they are so good vs other mu's that I feel completely comfortable running 4 mainboard. In my opinion, Flamewake phoenix is one of the cards that gives this deck game. I started with 0 in my list and then tried 2, then quickly went up to 4. the recursion is extremely relevant when almost every creature can bring it back; You can M2 it to block for a turn, in stalled games it will win w/ a shaman in play, alone it will win vs control. I have found that against abzans intense removal suite a lot of the time they will start to overpower us at about 5-8 life total and the phoenix will go the distance. If the walker and the phoenix weren't standard, I would not be playing Temur, in general the deck matches up poorly vs abzan and red based removal, unless you can pack 8 2 drops that go right through caryatid and courser.
Temur Charm is an interesting card and one that I have felt fine maining 2 of. You can get a variety of plays with it and really turn the deck into two or three different things. The main thing that I can say about the charm is that when on the play you go t2 dude, turn 3 knucks, then hold up temur charm and knucks U/G abilities for the rest of the game, it is incredibly hard to lose. So temur charm acts as a big Tempo style effect for the decks that are slower than you. For the decks that are faster, such as RW, the temur charm will be a fight mechanic or on the rare occasion the 3rd ability will come into effect. If Temur charm didn't have mana leak drawback I would consider playing 4. As it is, it is rarely a bad draw and sometimes it is a blowout. Also, if the game is going later, you can use temur charm in response to removal to have your guy eat one of theirs (if they have 3 mana up). That play happens quite a bit more than you'd think.
I don't really like the mystics, I started with dorks and ramping into fatties and just lost to thoughtseize and red based removal and then when everything goes to plan you power out your Polukranos or w/e and they downfall it and you are stuck w/ very little to do. The dorks made the deck seem anemic to me too often. Craters claws has a lot of upside, but when you are on the draw and they remove your guy, it will often sit in your hand waiting to take an entire turn to kill their dude that is beating you to death already. I started at 4 and cut to 3 then 2, I'm fairly happy w/ 2 because of the reach, but I wouldn't play more. I don't like the nest in the board, I decided to go with Bow of nylea for my RW mu's because more often than not the burn was closing games out regardless of how secure the board was. With Bow I can gain a steady 3 life a turn (1 card essentially) and it even has cute interactions with Yasova and Shaman in some instances.
No Frost walker is definitely boarded out vs Raise the alarm/Outburst decks. It helps in Every Other Matchup though, and I find that more important. More often than not RW aggro mu's depend on the coinflip anyways, especially if you are also running Rabblemaster.
Yeah, Temur charm becomes a lot better on the play when you are trying to go for that out tempo play you mentioned.
any changes you would make to the deck?
Props to DarkNightCavalier 4 da banner and SGT_Chubbz 4 avvie, here
Standard
GRAggro
GRWNaya Purphoros
GWAggro Retired 9/19/2014
RGPrimeval Titan RIP
1/5/2010 - 9/30/2011
Top 4 Channelfireball Winter series 5k Feb. 2011
3rd at California National Qualifiers 2011
40th at GP SLC 2012
Find me on MTGO @ Ruslvmusl91
Not in the main deck. I was very happy with it overall. I am, however, trying Destructive Revelry in place of Back to Nature, and 2 Hornet Nest instead of Burn Away and Aetherspouts.