14 land is insane... you'll have nothing but 0 land opening hands. Also I have always hated soul-scar mage, perhaps it was worse when thraben inspector was around but I am wary of 1 power non evasive creature.
I didn't open any opt at prelease so I wont be playing until I find some (I actually need 8, 4 more for modern)
been a long fan of this deck, is there a possibility we could go Temur with Deeproot Champ as an extra creature to Enigma and Cryptic? Also, what are your thoughts on Jace?
I'm not sure about Chart a Course for this deck as it is better post-combat while the deck wants to cast its spells either before combat or during combat (at instant speed) to pump up the creatures and animate Riddleform.
That's why Strategic Planning seems slightly better for the card selection and GY-filling.
I really like your list, very focused. I think I would run Chart, but that's just a preference thing.
A card I haven't seen anyone mention is Dive Down, it's pretty great at protecting our threats and a combat trick too!
Also, a decent board wipe is Fiery Cannonade, it doesn't kill any of our stuff and is decent against almost all the go wide token strategies and Red aggro and it has the plus side of being an Instant, and with Soul-scar Mage it shrinks even the big threats by a large margin. Obviously terrible against Pirates, but that might not even be a thing to worry about. You could also run Siren Stormtamer as a cheap disruptive 1 drop to get in some cheap damage and provide another way to protect the bigger stuff and yourself.
I personally hate soul scour mage so I would 100% run siren stormtamer over it, if I run a 1 drop creature at all. I remain skecptical of unsummon, It really depends on the metagame for that one, good against BG though. I do think riddleform is a nice fumerole replacement though, also has late game utility. Evolving wilds huh.. it has come to this.
I really enjoyed the 1 mana cyclers of Censor and hyroglyphic illumination.. just to get my grave filling quickly. I don't think i'd run spell piece main they replace the negates in your sideboard and keep the censors. Illumination I almost never cast always cycled so I guess i'll drop them. my deck is sort of semi comboish rather than straight tempo.
Somehow after prerelease, release and a sealed PPTQ, I only have 1 opt as such I can't put the deck together yet and 0 Chart a course either which I was intending to use as a better tormenting voice (will cast before combat no problem)
I think Evolving Wilds is unnecessary, if I'm going to play a tap land it'll be Highland Lake. Opt and other card draw should be enough to find land.
Riddleform is often the best card in my deck, sure it dies to some removal, but that's just the price of playing anything.
Unsummon has a lot of flexibility, removing threats or saving your own.
Fiery Cannonade offers a lot of upside against RRed, being an instant is huge but SSuns just kills so much for the cost. I'm going to try a split of those and see how it goes.
Playing 14x lands is just asking for trouble no matter how many cantrips you run, not even Legacy decks (with Brainstorm, Ponder and Preordain) do this.
It is just bad deck-building imho.
After some testing with my list I've decided to drop Strategic Planning as it is too slow despite offering so much needed card selection.
I'm trying out maindeck Censor instead for more interaction, I've considered Supreme Will as Well but it seems a bit slow. Search for Azcanta is a slow card for control decks and has no place in a tempo strategy imho.
The deck has real trouble catching up from behind and when Spell Pierce becomes irrelevant it is difficult to interact with opposing spells
(and creatures that outsize Lightning Strike).
Soul-Scar Mage is the best 1-drop for the deck, sure it doesn't have haste or evasion but it at least has to respected for its damage potential unlike a creature like Siren Stormtamer which will always be 1-power and can just be ignored.
I can only see the addition of Siren Stormtamer instead of a spell if you are really worried about removal and want a proactive protection spell.
I prefer Evolving Wilds to Highland Lake in the deck purely for deck-thinning purposes (as negligeble as it might be) as the deck can operate on a low land count and I prefer to draw fewer lands.
Dive Down is such a situational card, if it was playable on its own like Blossoming Defense I'd play it.
I don't really like Crash Through as well, it is too situational and even something like Renegade Tactics might be better.
Thinking of going for a slightly slower approach, but with payoff in the late game. Curator of Mysteries adds another flying threat that also allows you to cycle through your deck and craft your hand. I like Cryptic Serpent, but its lack of evasion made me want to play one less.
I instead put in a copy ofThe Locust God to reward card draw and cycling, which the deck has plenty of. With drawing/cycling a little more relevant now, playing 4 copies of Censor just made a bit more sense. It's either play a threat on the second turn with Riddleform or Force Spike something and play Enigma Drake safely the following turn.
With slightly less speed but more evasive creatures, maybe we could branch off to this sort of direction with the deck.
Am I missing something... highland lake is no longer in standard?? I added the scavenger grounds because I want to side in a land that one seemed like the best option.
The hell where was it printed? I can't find where it comes from. Its on gatherer but not in the ahmonkhet spoilers.
So the World championships on the weekend. Search for Azcanta has proved its strenght at least in control decks it has synergy here even if it is slow I can easily flip it turn 4.
What I like about this deck is we can use Search for Azcanta, but then have a sideboard that looks like a mix of Temur and Raminup Red we get to use a lot of the powerful cards in these colours.
The hell where was it printed? I can't find where it comes from. Its on gatherer but not in the ahmonkhet spoilers.
So the World championships on the weekend. Search for Azcanta has proved its strenght at least in control decks it has synergy here even if it is slow I can easily flip it turn 4.
What I like about this deck is we can use Search for Azcanta, but then have a sideboard that looks like a mix of Temur and Raminup Red we get to use a lot of the powerful cards in these colours.
This is the list I cobbled together to play at standard showdown.
Match 1 vs Temur midrange.
Just flooded out both games
large hydra's or glorybringers at inoppotune times.
Match 2 vs Ruinap red
they were new to the deck.
Game 1 They got stuck on three land I slamed three Cryptic serpent.
Game 2 much closer but I removed thier early plays. Got hit with a glorybringer for a few turns until I sucked it up and used two burn spells on it. I was able to leverage Serpent and Ruins to kill in 3 swings.
Match 3 vs UW approach.
Game 1 had a 10/4 Drake. I censor his end of turn cast out. He didn't have another answer.
Game 2 I counter the first approach.I fight him as he tries to answer my large drakes tapping me out, he casts second approach.
Game 3
Match 4 vs 4 colour energy.
Game 1 I manage to get out a serpent early to stop any attacks by down comes the Scrab god and I can't swing through. I reply with (6/4) drake and he replies with glorybringer :/ kills it. I have injury and fling, I chose not to fling the drake... draw.. another fling.. argh!.. i injury and flip the seperent putting my opponent to 3. he cannot kill me on the back swing. I have one turn to draw lightning strike (or a creature to fling). draw land dead. I have insult in grave and Ruins on the field but I can't use both. frustrating!
Game 2 i go to quickly flip search for azcanta, but he plays a chandra.. I see chandra's defeat on top.. play my own chandra tick up for mana.. Defeat on chandra shock on rogue refiner.. Then I was able to defend Chandra until ulti... lightning strike and shock with chandra emblem ends the game.
Game 3. Basically I just can't find any instant and sorceries to fill my grave he kills me with Nissa and lands.
2-2... average... at least there was another chart a course in my prize packs.
What do you think of hostile desert?, I found I had no issue getting lands into my graveyard... sometimes too much of an issue :s. I am thinking I cut a wrath to put in another.
I also think I don't quite have the right sideboard stratgey for temur/the energy decks and I need to keep in or get more counterspells for them Countervailing Winds perhaps.
BtW, here is a pretty similar deck which splashes Green for Deeproot Champion and Blossoming Defense and uses Attune with Aether to cheat on lands and play only 17x (which is too risky imho, as I always have trouble with mana even playing 20+ lands).
None of my creatures die to lightning strike or fatal push since I blank my opponents removal it is like having more creatures. I guess I have a bit of an issue with harness lightning :s.
Insult and fling allow me to win the game from almost anywhere... extremely powerful... they look a lot worse than they actually are. the temur midrange decks just gum up the ground and air with a million thopters so you just kill them off with the fling burn.
I still really hate soul-scar mage its got one power and no evasion it just runs into junk and is a terrible blocker.
Blanking Push is good and all, but having threats is usually better and they can still revolt Push your Drake. I like running 12 to 16 threats for more resilience.
Soul-scar should always attack for at least 2 and makes all of your burn spells permanently shrink opposing creatures, it rewards using the burn spells as combat tricks, it does a lot of work for 1 Mana.
I have a question with Scarab God, hostage taker and hazoret being the big threats in standard is there a reason why Essence scatter isn't considered for the sideboard?
It's definitely worth some slots, right now most decks rely on creatures big and small to win, except for UW Approach, so it could even be in the main if you have a harder time dealing with stuff like that. Unsummon on some of those more costly threats makes for a huge swing in tempo, then Essence Scatter them on the recast, it's like double timewalk-ing the opponent.
Well i dusted off my soul-scar mages and riddleforms just to see what that version is like. Its... really quite different.
My version makes a lot of use of cycling and discard because the goal is to get instants and sourceries into the graveyard as quickly as possible but the Soul-riddleform deck really wants you to cast the cards so you have to play 1 mana spells not 1 mana cyclers.
So I am trying to get 12/4 drakes, the Sour scour version only wants 4/4s.
I didn't open any opt at prelease so I wont be playing until I find some (I actually need 8, 4 more for modern)
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
been a long fan of this deck, is there a possibility we could go Temur with Deeproot Champ as an extra creature to Enigma and Cryptic? Also, what are your thoughts on Jace?
4x Soul-Scar Mage
4x Enigma Drake
4x Cryptic Serpent
Enchantment (4)
4x Riddleform
Instant (20)
4x Opt
4x Spell Pierce
4x Unsummon
4x Shock
4x Lightning Strike
4x Strategic Planning
Land (20)
4x Spirebluff Canal
4x Evolving Wilds
6x Island
6x Mountain
4x Abrade
4x Negate
3x Sweltering Suns
4x Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Maybe it is worth splitting Abrade 2/2 with Magma Spray, another option might be Chandra's Defeat if Red decks continue to be prominent as a 1-mana removal for Glorybringer/Chandra and other creatures (even Hazoret if you have Soul-Scar Mage on baord).
I'm not sure about Chart a Course for this deck as it is better post-combat while the deck wants to cast its spells either before combat or during combat (at instant speed) to pump up the creatures and animate Riddleform.
That's why Strategic Planning seems slightly better for the card selection and GY-filling.
I wonder if Select for Inspection is worth consideration as a situational Unsummon for the added value of "scry 1".
Ehat about freen splash with that merlfolk the get counter with instant and sorcery?
A card I haven't seen anyone mention is Dive Down, it's pretty great at protecting our threats and a combat trick too!
Also, a decent board wipe is Fiery Cannonade, it doesn't kill any of our stuff and is decent against almost all the go wide token strategies and Red aggro and it has the plus side of being an Instant, and with Soul-scar Mage it shrinks even the big threats by a large margin. Obviously terrible against Pirates, but that might not even be a thing to worry about. You could also run Siren Stormtamer as a cheap disruptive 1 drop to get in some cheap damage and provide another way to protect the bigger stuff and yourself.
Needs moar Delver.
I really enjoyed the 1 mana cyclers of Censor and hyroglyphic illumination.. just to get my grave filling quickly. I don't think i'd run spell piece main they replace the negates in your sideboard and keep the censors. Illumination I almost never cast always cycled so I guess i'll drop them. my deck is sort of semi comboish rather than straight tempo.
swelting suns still exists don't need fiery cannonade
Somehow after prerelease, release and a sealed PPTQ, I only have 1 opt as such I can't put the deck together yet and 0 Chart a course either which I was intending to use as a better tormenting voice (will cast before combat no problem)
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
Riddleform is often the best card in my deck, sure it dies to some removal, but that's just the price of playing anything.
Unsummon has a lot of flexibility, removing threats or saving your own.
Fiery Cannonade offers a lot of upside against RRed, being an instant is huge but SSuns just kills so much for the cost. I'm going to try a split of those and see how it goes.
Needs moar Delver.
It is just bad deck-building imho.
After some testing with my list I've decided to drop Strategic Planning as it is too slow despite offering so much needed card selection.
I'm trying out maindeck Censor instead for more interaction, I've considered Supreme Will as Well but it seems a bit slow.
Search for Azcanta is a slow card for control decks and has no place in a tempo strategy imho.
The deck has real trouble catching up from behind and when Spell Pierce becomes irrelevant it is difficult to interact with opposing spells
(and creatures that outsize Lightning Strike).
Soul-Scar Mage is the best 1-drop for the deck, sure it doesn't have haste or evasion but it at least has to respected for its damage potential unlike a creature like Siren Stormtamer which will always be 1-power and can just be ignored.
I can only see the addition of Siren Stormtamer instead of a spell if you are really worried about removal and want a proactive protection spell.
I prefer Evolving Wilds to Highland Lake in the deck purely for deck-thinning purposes (as negligeble as it might be) as the deck can operate on a low land count and I prefer to draw fewer lands.
Dive Down is such a situational card, if it was playable on its own like Blossoming Defense I'd play it.
I don't really like Crash Through as well, it is too situational and even something like Renegade Tactics might be better.
I instead put in a copy ofThe Locust God to reward card draw and cycling, which the deck has plenty of. With drawing/cycling a little more relevant now, playing 4 copies of Censor just made a bit more sense. It's either play a threat on the second turn with Riddleform or Force Spike something and play Enigma Drake safely the following turn.
With slightly less speed but more evasive creatures, maybe we could branch off to this sort of direction with the deck.
3 Curator of Mysteries
3 Cryptic Serpent
1 The Locust God
4 Riddleform
4 Opt
4 Hieroglyphic Illumination
4 Censor
2 Spell Pierce
4 Lightning Strike
4 Shock
4 Spirebluff Canal
3 Evolving Wilds
8 Island
4 Mountain
3 Negate
2 Nimble Obstructionist
2 Magma Spray
2 Abrade
1 Dual Shot
3 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
2 Sweltering Suns
4x Enigma Drake
4x Cryptic Serpent
Enchantment (4)
4x Riddleform
Instant (18)
4x Opt
4x Censor
4x Shock
4x Lightning Strike
2x Fling
4x Strategic Planning
4x Chart a Course
2x Insult // Injury
Land (20)
4x Spirebluff Canal
4x Evolving Wilds
4x Ramunap Ruins
6x Island
2x Mountain
4x Abrade
4x Spell piece
2x Sweltering Suns
2x Chandra, Torch of Defiance
2x Glorybringer
2x Vance's blasting cannons
1x Scavenger Grounds
Am I missing something... highland lake is no longer in standard?? I added the scavenger grounds because I want to side in a land that one seemed like the best option.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
Scavenger Ground is good against the GPG decks and other graveyard stuff, it messes Enigma up too, but usually worth the hit to stop them.
Needs moar Delver.
So the World championships on the weekend.
Search for Azcanta has proved its strenght at least in control decks it has synergy here even if it is slow I can easily flip it turn 4.
Fatal push and the likely enchantment hate for Search for Azcanta makes me think riddleform is just weaker than Search for Azcanta even if it attacks and blocks, it seems too vunerable I want to blank my opponents pushes, also dies to lightning strike and essence extraction. Although it can avoid the can't block effects in red.
What I like about this deck is we can use Search for Azcanta, but then have a sideboard that looks like a mix of Temur and Raminup Red we get to use a lot of the powerful cards in these colours.
I am a bit worried about more gravehate appearing to fight Search for Azcanta.
Also unsummon is good against The Scarab god and Longtusk cub so perhaps I'll try to find space for it.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
The SOI Lands were reprinted in the Amonkhet Deckbuilder's Toolkit. https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Amonkhet/Deck_Builder's_Toolkit
Needs moar Delver.
4x Enigma Drake
4x Cryptic Serpent
Enchantment (2)
2x Search for azcanta
Instant (21)
4x Opt
4x Censor
4x Shock
4x Lightning Strike
2x Fling
3x hieroglyphic illumination
1x Chart a Course
2x Insult // Injury
Land (22)
4x Spirebluff Canal
4x Evolving Wilds
4x Ramunap Ruins
6x Island
4x Mountain
2x Abrade
2x Spell piece
2x Negate
2x Chandra's defeat
2x Sweltering Suns
2x Chandra, Torch of Defiance
2x Glorybringer
1x Hostile Desert
This is the list I cobbled together to play at standard showdown.
Just flooded out both games
large hydra's or glorybringers at inoppotune times.
Match 2 vs Ruinap red
they were new to the deck.
Game 1 They got stuck on three land I slamed three Cryptic serpent.
Game 2 much closer but I removed thier early plays. Got hit with a glorybringer for a few turns until I sucked it up and used two burn spells on it. I was able to leverage Serpent and Ruins to kill in 3 swings.
Match 3 vs UW approach.
Game 1 had a 10/4 Drake. I censor his end of turn cast out. He didn't have another answer.
Game 2 I counter the first approach.I fight him as he tries to answer my large drakes tapping me out, he casts second approach.
Game 3
Match 4 vs 4 colour energy.
Game 1 I manage to get out a serpent early to stop any attacks by down comes the Scrab god and I can't swing through. I reply with (6/4) drake and he replies with glorybringer :/ kills it. I have injury and fling, I chose not to fling the drake... draw.. another fling.. argh!.. i injury and flip the seperent putting my opponent to 3. he cannot kill me on the back swing. I have one turn to draw lightning strike (or a creature to fling). draw land dead. I have insult in grave and Ruins on the field but I can't use both. frustrating!
Game 2 i go to quickly flip search for azcanta, but he plays a chandra.. I see chandra's defeat on top.. play my own chandra tick up for mana.. Defeat on chandra shock on rogue refiner.. Then I was able to defend Chandra until ulti... lightning strike and shock with chandra emblem ends the game.
Game 3. Basically I just can't find any instant and sorceries to fill my grave he kills me with Nissa and lands.
2-2... average... at least there was another chart a course in my prize packs.
What do you think of hostile desert?, I found I had no issue getting lands into my graveyard... sometimes too much of an issue :s. I am thinking I cut a wrath to put in another.
I also think I don't quite have the right sideboard stratgey for temur/the energy decks and I need to keep in or get more counterspells for them Countervailing Winds perhaps.
So +1 chart a course -1 hieroglyphic illumination
-1 sweltering suns + hostile desert
-2 abrade + 2 countervailing winds
Perhaps I am cutting too much for the red match up but I also think I sided too much to begin with.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
I'd definetly play threats (Soul-Scar Mage/Riddleform or even Nimble Obstructionist)
over cards like Fling/Insult // Injury which do nothing on their own.
BtW, here is a pretty similar deck which splashes Green for Deeproot Champion and Blossoming Defense and uses Attune with Aether to cheat on lands and play only 17x (which is too risky imho, as I always have trouble with mana even playing 20+ lands).
Insult and fling allow me to win the game from almost anywhere... extremely powerful... they look a lot worse than they actually are. the temur midrange decks just gum up the ground and air with a million thopters so you just kill them off with the fling burn.
I still really hate soul-scar mage its got one power and no evasion it just runs into junk and is a terrible blocker.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
Soul-scar should always attack for at least 2 and makes all of your burn spells permanently shrink opposing creatures, it rewards using the burn spells as combat tricks, it does a lot of work for 1 Mana.
Needs moar Delver.
Needs moar Delver.
My version makes a lot of use of cycling and discard because the goal is to get instants and sourceries into the graveyard as quickly as possible but the Soul-riddleform deck really wants you to cast the cards so you have to play 1 mana spells not 1 mana cyclers.
So I am trying to get 12/4 drakes, the Sour scour version only wants 4/4s.
Hmm I am definately overlooking essence scatter, not sure what the cut is... negate? and keeping the spell piece hmm.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
4 enigma drake
4 cryptic serpent
4 opt
4 crash through
2 unsummon
2 spell pierce
4 shock
4 chart a course
4 strategic planning
4 lightning strike
1 vance's blasting cannons
2 evolving wilds
1 hostile desert
9 island
3 mountain
C Long Live Eldrazi C
Needs moar Delver.