I think the cycling deserts aren't worth it, other than being on a budget, it would be more worth while to run the cycling dual lands and open up off color main and sideboard options for almost the same effect.
However, I think Ramunap Ruins is a great addition to the deck because color requirements are low, so often it won't deal much or any damage to you and then you can sac it for the last few points of damage. Ipnu Rivulet could even find a home here, this is probably the only place it's actually good: making Countervailing winds, Drakes, and Serpents that much more potent at instant speed in a non-spell slot is pretty cool, add in aftermath cards and it's starting to look even better.
Take Inventory needs a full playset and isn't very fast. You can improve it's speed by discarding a first copy to another spell like Lighting Axe, but even then there are quicker options. Catalog is outclassed by Tragic Lesson, because of the return a land option you can reset an Aetherhub or play it during your main phase and replay the land if you don't have a 4th land drop, essentially making it cost 1U.
Slip Through Space is better than Crash Through for getting damage in, provided you have something to target. You often won't be able to dig for a second or third land in the first 2 turns. I'm cutting lands for cheap cantrips so I like the ability to just play it and draw a card regardless of what the board is like, much like cycling. I'm thinking of dropping some of my creature only removal for Slip and just racing.
yeah i'm finding riddleform to be surprisingly good.
if there was just one more 1 cost non targeting cantrip i would play a play set of riddleform over Stormchaser Mage (as it only hits for around 1-3 each turn anyway) its also conveniently gives the option to transform not a compulsory trigger. meaning it works very well with thing in the ice as you can cast the third spell for thing in the ice then the fourth and stack the triggers so thing in the ice transforms befor riddle form becomes a creature.
(and loving late game scrying before cantriping)
Oh man, I hadn't even thought about that interaction with TiTi trigger and Riddleforms trigger, that's back breaking. If the 4th ice counter gets removed by Insult in that situation, that's exactly 20!
@Kpal: I would say it's more mid-range or even tempo. The deck aims to control the board with burn and counters then it hits a turning point, usually around turn 3-5, where it can make big must answer threats like Drake or Serpent. At that point it can be more picky on what to counter and burn can go to the opponent to help speed up the clock.
How are the Countervailing Winds working out? I just got some and added them, but haven't tested with them yet. Seeing Supreme Will in action from UR control it seems so good, but my intuition is CW is probably still better in this deck, especially late game.
Cheers for starting this thread. This is my kind of deck, I'm all a twitter. Can't wait to watch it develop. Still need a few pieces but I'll try and contribute to the R&D.
Since your list is low on counter spells and is relying on being as aggressive as it can be, you may want to consider Soul-Scar Mage. It makes your burn spells much better against opposing creatures, permanently shrinking them if it can't kill it and gives you the ability to kill Indestructible threats. Then, as a board wipe, you can run Kozilek's Return . It's an instant, won't kill your stuff, and will shrink/kill an army of creatures if you have the Soul-Scar out. You could even have an Emerge creature, probably Elder deep fiend, to trigger it's graveyard ability if you were feeling extra spicy.
Update: I got two URb control match ups in a row at FNM, it was hard before Bolas but wow is Bolas a beating. And one of them sided in The Scarab God which is the real deal. Abrade was as good as advertised against Gearhulk, but the other threats still pulled them the wins.
My other loss was against a 4 color dredge style deck with Prized Amalgams, Elder deep fiends and such. I was able to get them down to 2 life in both games and then got swarmed. Definitely a frustrating FNM.
So I've been doing lots of testing (along with enjoying other decks) and I think Riddleform is an auto-include as a 4-of here. It's a real sleeper and I think it could be the next smuggler's copter, minus the filtering.
Riddleform has been good for me also, it's synergy with Titi makes them a nice combo. It's addition has made me brainstorm into trying Unsubstantiate. It serves a few purposes here: bouncing opponents creatures on our turn so we can attack with Riddleform, bouncing our own creatures to save them from removal giving us the ability to be grindy, bouncing an opponents spell to pretty much time walk them. Another line of play is bouncing your own spell and replaying it for quicker Titi flips. They may also try to replay their bounced spell during the same turn and you can hopefully catch it with a Censor giving it some more mileage into the midgame. Bounce is good against tokens, man lands, creatures with counters on them etc.., so it's nice to have this flexibility and stop almost any spell for a turn. It definitely has it's drawback of not stopping any threats for good, but sometimes you just need another turn to seal the deal.
This deck really hasn't made much of a splash, but I think it could be very well positioned with the release of Riddleform, so I thought I'd do a breakdown of the current metagame and see where we stand:
Top tier:
Zombies
Monument
Both decks play their hands as quick as possible, both have plenty of value and recursion, and both can kill quite quickly. The best cards we can run vs zombies is Magma Spray, followed by Incendiary Flow, and the best cards we can run vs Monument is Abrade (as it can kill their threats or their monument) followed by Sweltering Suns/other sweepers that do 3 damage. Thing in the Ice is solid vs both. The fact that both of these decks are the top tier is a solid reason to run this deck, as we definitely have a favored matchup vs both.
Monument is definitely the tougher matchup, they have flying blockers and can interact via spell quellers as well as a very solid clock. Sweepers win that matchup.
Tier 2:
Temur Energy
Mardu Ballista
URx Control
Energy is a really tough matchup, they have more than enough removal for all of our threats while we don't really have enough for theirs. Magma Spray is much less valuable here and they really don't run artifacts so Abrade isn't good either. Sweltering Suns is a good card for the matchup, assuming you can resolve it before their Bristling Hydras or Longtusk Cubs can get to 4 toughness. Hour of Devastation is a solid addition to our sb for this matchup, and unsummon is good too. Thing in the Ice actually pretty significantly helps this matchup as an early blocker and a pseudo wipe that removes counters from cub and hydra. This is a midrange deck and the best way we could increase our win percentage against them is to give ourselves some much-needed recursion/grindyness. Grapple with the Past is great for this matchup, as is Blossoming Defense. If you're staying in UR then Unsummon can pull double duty as protection for our own critters or "removal" for theirs. Best when backed up by an Essence Scatter or Censor to counter their recast.
Ballista is an easier matchup, but still very grindy. The presence of these 2 decks as such a force in the meta is a very good argument for going Temur and including Grapple with the Past and/or Blossoming Defense. Magma Spray is much better here than vs temur energy, and Abrade has a lot more targets too. Sweepers are still great vs both these matchups (as well as the top tier matchups)which seems to me to be very strong arguement to run at least 3 Sweltering Suns MB alongside 4 Thing in the Ice.
Control is our worst matchup easily. It's why all of my sideboards include 6 slots dedicated almost entirely to the control matchup. I run 3x Dispel and 3x Negate. An argument could be made for Fevered Visions, which is very good vs control, or for Chandra, Torch of Defiance, but the issue with both is actually resolving one. I'm open to suggestions on this matchup.
Tier 3
Red Deck Wins
Emerge
Misc Decks
From here on out it's quite tough to plan for these matchups because the decks vary so much. Generally speaking, Abrade is great and Magma Spray is great and Sweltering Suns is great. Emerge is a tough matchup and one of the easiest ways to deal with it is to kill off their emerge sac targets while they are tapped out. Counterspells like Essence Scatter are also awesome for the Emerge matchup, as you can potentially 2-for-1 them by countering their emerged critter.
Notes: One obvious theme is that red is great vs most of the meta.Magma Spray and Abrade and Sweltering Suns are great vs the top tier, good vs Mardu Ballista, and Sweltering Suns is good vs Temur Energy. Spray and Abrade aren't entirely worthless vs energy, but there are lots of critters that dodge them entirely. Spray/Abrade/Suns is also a solid removal suite against unknown/rogue decks.
We need to be able to grind better. Midrange makes up a huge chunk of the meta, and UR is not a great midrange color combo. We need more recursion to be able to survive the long and grindy matchups, and to me it seems like going Temur is the best way to do this. Grapple with the Past is great, Blossoming Defense is solid. I'm not sure what the other grindy options are, white doesn't give us much and neither does black in terms of grindyness. One solution instead of running temur would be to run more grindy pw's like Chandra, but then that lowers the I/S count for our big drakes and cheap serpents and TITI flips, which are already lowered to make room for Riddleform. One possible solution is Bloodwater Entity which gives us a nice 2/2 flying body with prowess and guarantees our next draw to be gas. It can't bring back a creature or a riddleform though, but it can bring back a sweeper or something else. Now that we're playing Riddleform, Benefaction of Rhonas seems like it could be great for this role, dumping useless lands and filling our gy with i/s's while giving us new critters. Champion of Wits is also interesting, both as a 3 mana faithless looting stapled to a 2/1 body and for the late-game ability to get a 4/4 and draw 4 discard 2. CoW does decrease our i/s count however.
We need an answer for creatures with toughness 4 or more. Harnessed Energy won't do the trick as we don't run the full energy suite. This is as good a reason as any to run W or B instead of G as our splash. White has all sorts of great removal for critters like Glorybringer or Bristling Hydra or whatever x/4 is currently beating your face. Black has fewer answers but has more recursion to handle our other weaknesses.
Right now I'm contemplating either a strict UR list running the 60 I posted earlier with a sideboard containing Unsummon, Bloodwater Entity, and Champion of Wits, or a Temur list containing Grapple with the Past, Benefaction of Rhonas, or Bloodwater Entity, or trying a Grixis list with Never // Return, Wander in Death.
Finally, a fourth route I've been considering would be to try 4 colors. The pieces are there and thankfully the landbase isn't too challenging if you toss in a playset of Attune with Aether, Aether Hubs, etc. The issue there is that Cryptic Serpent and Bedlam Reveler are both UU or RR creatures, which is really tough for a 4c mana base.
Your break down is very nice, thank you for putting all that detail in!:)
I think Whites biggest card for us is Blessed Alliance, it's cheap versatile and effective. You also get Call the Gatewatch so you can run a virtual play set of a planeswalker without actually running that many so you don't drop your I/S count
Green for Grapple with the Past is very good, add in Bloodwater Entity shenanigans and you can keep looping these two back and forth keeping an annoying blocker and filling up your graveyard until you can do something stupid like attack with a 20/4 Drake. If you have Pulse of Murasa in that scenario you are gaining a lot of life. Kiora, Master of the Depths has similar uses of card selection and a game winning ultimate. It also opens up Nature's Way as a spot removal spell that is awesome with Serpent or Drake.
Black gives you Collective Brutality which does everything we want in a nice little package. Lay Bare the Heart and Doomfall are also great discard spells, between them you can destroy their hand and take over.
There is also a strong argument for colorless as the splash, Thought-knot SeerMatter Reshaper and Warping Wail are all strong additions. Between Aether Hub and deserts supporting them should be fairly easy.
Edit 1: Unsubstantiate was really good for me tonight, TiTi and Riddleform we're all stars and sideboard Lanthu Hellions felt so good against combo and control. I hilarious got paired against a mill deck and attacked with 13/4 drakes for the win. I also got to kill someone with a red desert.
Red deck-haste-eldrazi-wins was a beating and my only match loss, if my draws had been better it would have been a closer match.
I didn't win a match at game day with my UR burn deck :/.
These lists look a lot different to what I was expecting for an enigma drake deck, I long since gave up on playing thing in the ice in my UR burn list because it just died to fatal push and grasp and harnessed lighting and glorybringer and chandra... and any other destroy effect that I couldn't keep it alive to flip the damn thing.
I just drafted out this.. combo heavy version.. by pulling cards out of my trash piles and rare folder in a hurry.
I didn't win a match at game day with my UR burn deck :/.
These lists look a lot different to what I was expecting for an enigma drake deck, I long since gave up on playing thing in the ice in my UR burn list because it just died to fatal push and grasp and harnessed lighting and glorybringer and chandra... and any other destroy effect that I couldn't keep it alive to flip the damn thing.
I just drafted out this.. combo heavy version.. by pulling cards out of my trash piles and rare folder in a hurry.
Fiery Temper is a huge plus when you are running Lighting Axe, killing a x/3 and a x/5 or a x/8 creature for double red or just kill a creature and bolt your opponent for 3. Getting extra value from Cathartic Reunion is great too.
If you have trouble with control, Glyph Keeper can be good in the side, if they counter or kill it you can Embalm. It naturally has a lot of card advantage attached to a fairly quick evasive clock. Those games are longer and grindy so you can actually afford the cost.
Its lame duck standard lets play something silly.... goes 3-1. although to be fair others are doing the same.. my loss was to GR Werewolves of all things. beat BW horses, Runinap red and atherflux resivior combo.
Insult to injury was good, censor was meh and I was a little disappointed in the serpent, people seemed to havea lot of chumps for it. but it was a threat that had to be dealt with and can't be pushed.
I won a lot of games off Chandra and glorybringer out of the side to be honest, but the rapid card draw and filtering was great at finding them and the lands to cast them.
How would the deck look post-rotation ?
It is getting some good cards from Ixalan from recent spoilers (Opt, Lightning Strike and Spell Pierce).
The main problem seems to be losing one the UR dual lands in Wandering Fumerole.
You can always use Ramunap Ruins. Been using a playset over Fumarole, and it's working a lot better, since it comes into play untapped.
Then again, my deck is a lot more aggro-focused than most lists I've seen here. I can't post the list now, but it's a UR Prowess with Dispels and Built to Smash (they've been great against damage-based removal), 3 Enigma Drakes and 4 Crash Trough / Slip Through Space / Expedite.
I'll use it on today's event and FNM, against a bunch of Monored and Temur Energy/GB Constrictor. I'll try to post the full list and the results here.
Well I won FNM, although a contingent of our stores better players are away at nationals. (I did qualify it is just a long flight away)
I cut two lands for two tormenting voice, 22 lands. The mulligans could be torturous so I am thinking that was a mistake.. still I won through mulls to 5.
And the land I haven't worked out yet and I need some anti slow midrange/control card to replace fevered visions maybe Search for Azcanta? It is easy to flip in this deck or perhaps riddleform does that job well as well.
I have been very supirsed about how strong insult // injury is, can be pitched and used as removal or can just amp an attack for a win. I think it is stronger than the flip artifact.
I have not wanted any unsummon effects, my creatures are almost always bigger than my opponents, essence scatter seems better because glorybringer is scary.
How did I forget about spell piece D:, I definately need to find spot for it. I really like the way censor cycles to power my deck proactively.
Looking at a lot of the articles going around. Have we thought about chart a course? Basically a better tormenting voice in blue.
I think without firery temper I can push the deck much more blue than red.
Hmm yeah hazoret has killed me a bunch but typically start swinging for 10 by the time they empty thier hand it has to kill me the turn it comes out basically. Overall though unsummon is typically not good against haste creatures like this, it isn't getting its full tempo boost it normally does.
However, I think Ramunap Ruins is a great addition to the deck because color requirements are low, so often it won't deal much or any damage to you and then you can sac it for the last few points of damage. Ipnu Rivulet could even find a home here, this is probably the only place it's actually good: making Countervailing winds, Drakes, and Serpents that much more potent at instant speed in a non-spell slot is pretty cool, add in aftermath cards and it's starting to look even better.
Needs moar Delver.
C Long Live Eldrazi C
Slip Through Space is better than Crash Through for getting damage in, provided you have something to target. You often won't be able to dig for a second or third land in the first 2 turns. I'm cutting lands for cheap cantrips so I like the ability to just play it and draw a card regardless of what the board is like, much like cycling. I'm thinking of dropping some of my creature only removal for Slip and just racing.
Needs moar Delver.
It will even trigger your Riddleform on an otherwise empty board, the trigger will resolve first so it will get the benefit of trample.
Needs moar Delver.
C Long Live Eldrazi C
Oh man, I hadn't even thought about that interaction with TiTi trigger and Riddleforms trigger, that's back breaking. If the 4th ice counter gets removed by Insult in that situation, that's exactly 20!
@Kpal: I would say it's more mid-range or even tempo. The deck aims to control the board with burn and counters then it hits a turning point, usually around turn 3-5, where it can make big must answer threats like Drake or Serpent. At that point it can be more picky on what to counter and burn can go to the opponent to help speed up the clock.
Needs moar Delver.
Needs moar Delver.
Does anyone like Thing in the Ice?
C Long Live Eldrazi C
TiTi is awesome, it's just ridiculous and Riddleform is great with it.
Needs moar Delver.
4 Stormchaser Mage
4 Thing in the Ice
4 Riddleform
2 Enigma Drake
Spells 26
4 Shock
4 Expedite
4 Slip Through Space
4 Crash Through
4 Dispel
4 Incendiary Flow
2 Abrade
4 Wandering Fumarole
4 Spirebluff Canal
4 Ramunap Ruins
4 Mountin
4 Island
C Long Live Eldrazi C
Since your list is low on counter spells and is relying on being as aggressive as it can be, you may want to consider Soul-Scar Mage. It makes your burn spells much better against opposing creatures, permanently shrinking them if it can't kill it and gives you the ability to kill Indestructible threats. Then, as a board wipe, you can run Kozilek's Return . It's an instant, won't kill your stuff, and will shrink/kill an army of creatures if you have the Soul-Scar out. You could even have an Emerge creature, probably Elder deep fiend, to trigger it's graveyard ability if you were feeling extra spicy.
Update: I got two URb control match ups in a row at FNM, it was hard before Bolas but wow is Bolas a beating. And one of them sided in The Scarab God which is the real deal. Abrade was as good as advertised against Gearhulk, but the other threats still pulled them the wins.
My other loss was against a 4 color dredge style deck with Prized Amalgams, Elder deep fiends and such. I was able to get them down to 2 life in both games and then got swarmed. Definitely a frustrating FNM.
Needs moar Delver.
That plus the new
I'm trying a list like this:
4 Enigma Drake
4 Riddleform
4 Thing in the Ice
4 Cryptic Serpent
2 Bedlam Reveler
Removal
4 Incendiary Flow
3 Abrade
2 Lightning Axe
2 Magma Spray
2 Collective Defiance
2 Sweltering Suns
3 Strategic Planning
2 Cathartic Reunion
Lands
4 Wandering Fumarole
4 Spirebluff Canal
4 Ramunap Ruins
5 Island
5 Mountain
BG Rock
Modern:
RW Sun & Moon
RBG Dredge
RWG Burn
Legacy:
W Death & Taxes
Needs moar Delver.
Top tier:
Zombies
Monument
Both decks play their hands as quick as possible, both have plenty of value and recursion, and both can kill quite quickly. The best cards we can run vs zombies is Magma Spray, followed by Incendiary Flow, and the best cards we can run vs Monument is Abrade (as it can kill their threats or their monument) followed by Sweltering Suns/other sweepers that do 3 damage. Thing in the Ice is solid vs both. The fact that both of these decks are the top tier is a solid reason to run this deck, as we definitely have a favored matchup vs both.
Monument is definitely the tougher matchup, they have flying blockers and can interact via spell quellers as well as a very solid clock. Sweepers win that matchup.
Tier 2:
Temur Energy
Mardu Ballista
URx Control
Energy is a really tough matchup, they have more than enough removal for all of our threats while we don't really have enough for theirs. Magma Spray is much less valuable here and they really don't run artifacts so Abrade isn't good either. Sweltering Suns is a good card for the matchup, assuming you can resolve it before their Bristling Hydras or Longtusk Cubs can get to 4 toughness. Hour of Devastation is a solid addition to our sb for this matchup, and unsummon is good too. Thing in the Ice actually pretty significantly helps this matchup as an early blocker and a pseudo wipe that removes counters from cub and hydra. This is a midrange deck and the best way we could increase our win percentage against them is to give ourselves some much-needed recursion/grindyness. Grapple with the Past is great for this matchup, as is Blossoming Defense. If you're staying in UR then Unsummon can pull double duty as protection for our own critters or "removal" for theirs. Best when backed up by an Essence Scatter or Censor to counter their recast.
Ballista is an easier matchup, but still very grindy. The presence of these 2 decks as such a force in the meta is a very good argument for going Temur and including Grapple with the Past and/or Blossoming Defense. Magma Spray is much better here than vs temur energy, and Abrade has a lot more targets too. Sweepers are still great vs both these matchups (as well as the top tier matchups)which seems to me to be very strong arguement to run at least 3 Sweltering Suns MB alongside 4 Thing in the Ice.
Control is our worst matchup easily. It's why all of my sideboards include 6 slots dedicated almost entirely to the control matchup. I run 3x Dispel and 3x Negate. An argument could be made for Fevered Visions, which is very good vs control, or for Chandra, Torch of Defiance, but the issue with both is actually resolving one. I'm open to suggestions on this matchup.
Tier 3
Red Deck Wins
Emerge
Misc Decks
From here on out it's quite tough to plan for these matchups because the decks vary so much. Generally speaking, Abrade is great and Magma Spray is great and Sweltering Suns is great. Emerge is a tough matchup and one of the easiest ways to deal with it is to kill off their emerge sac targets while they are tapped out. Counterspells like Essence Scatter are also awesome for the Emerge matchup, as you can potentially 2-for-1 them by countering their emerged critter.
Notes:
One obvious theme is that red is great vs most of the meta. Magma Spray and Abrade and Sweltering Suns are great vs the top tier, good vs Mardu Ballista, and Sweltering Suns is good vs Temur Energy. Spray and Abrade aren't entirely worthless vs energy, but there are lots of critters that dodge them entirely. Spray/Abrade/Suns is also a solid removal suite against unknown/rogue decks.
We need to be able to grind better. Midrange makes up a huge chunk of the meta, and UR is not a great midrange color combo. We need more recursion to be able to survive the long and grindy matchups, and to me it seems like going Temur is the best way to do this. Grapple with the Past is great, Blossoming Defense is solid. I'm not sure what the other grindy options are, white doesn't give us much and neither does black in terms of grindyness. One solution instead of running temur would be to run more grindy pw's like Chandra, but then that lowers the I/S count for our big drakes and cheap serpents and TITI flips, which are already lowered to make room for Riddleform. One possible solution is Bloodwater Entity which gives us a nice 2/2 flying body with prowess and guarantees our next draw to be gas. It can't bring back a creature or a riddleform though, but it can bring back a sweeper or something else. Now that we're playing Riddleform, Benefaction of Rhonas seems like it could be great for this role, dumping useless lands and filling our gy with i/s's while giving us new critters. Champion of Wits is also interesting, both as a 3 mana faithless looting stapled to a 2/1 body and for the late-game ability to get a 4/4 and draw 4 discard 2. CoW does decrease our i/s count however.
We need an answer for creatures with toughness 4 or more. Harnessed Energy won't do the trick as we don't run the full energy suite. This is as good a reason as any to run W or B instead of G as our splash. White has all sorts of great removal for critters like Glorybringer or Bristling Hydra or whatever x/4 is currently beating your face. Black has fewer answers but has more recursion to handle our other weaknesses.
Right now I'm contemplating either a strict UR list running the 60 I posted earlier with a sideboard containing Unsummon, Bloodwater Entity, and Champion of Wits, or a Temur list containing Grapple with the Past, Benefaction of Rhonas, or Bloodwater Entity, or trying a Grixis list with Never // Return, Wander in Death.
Finally, a fourth route I've been considering would be to try 4 colors. The pieces are there and thankfully the landbase isn't too challenging if you toss in a playset of Attune with Aether, Aether Hubs, etc. The issue there is that Cryptic Serpent and Bedlam Reveler are both UU or RR creatures, which is really tough for a 4c mana base.
BG Rock
Modern:
RW Sun & Moon
RBG Dredge
RWG Burn
Legacy:
W Death & Taxes
I think Whites biggest card for us is Blessed Alliance, it's cheap versatile and effective. You also get Call the Gatewatch so you can run a virtual play set of a planeswalker without actually running that many so you don't drop your I/S count
Green for Grapple with the Past is very good, add in Bloodwater Entity shenanigans and you can keep looping these two back and forth keeping an annoying blocker and filling up your graveyard until you can do something stupid like attack with a 20/4 Drake. If you have Pulse of Murasa in that scenario you are gaining a lot of life. Kiora, Master of the Depths has similar uses of card selection and a game winning ultimate. It also opens up Nature's Way as a spot removal spell that is awesome with Serpent or Drake.
Black gives you Collective Brutality which does everything we want in a nice little package. Lay Bare the Heart and Doomfall are also great discard spells, between them you can destroy their hand and take over.
There is also a strong argument for colorless as the splash, Thought-knot Seer Matter Reshaper and Warping Wail are all strong additions. Between Aether Hub and deserts supporting them should be fairly easy.
Edit 1: Unsubstantiate was really good for me tonight, TiTi and Riddleform we're all stars and sideboard Lanthu Hellions felt so good against combo and control. I hilarious got paired against a mill deck and attacked with 13/4 drakes for the win. I also got to kill someone with a red desert.
Red deck-haste-eldrazi-wins was a beating and my only match loss, if my draws had been better it would have been a closer match.
Needs moar Delver.
These lists look a lot different to what I was expecting for an enigma drake deck, I long since gave up on playing thing in the ice in my UR burn list because it just died to fatal push and grasp and harnessed lighting and glorybringer and chandra... and any other destroy effect that I couldn't keep it alive to flip the damn thing.
I just drafted out this.. combo heavy version.. by pulling cards out of my trash piles and rare folder in a hurry.
4 Enigma drake
4 Cryptic serpent
2 Bedlamn revealer
Sorceries
4 cathartic reunion
4 strategic planning
2 Insult//injury
instants
4 Magma spray
4 Lightning axe
4 Censor
2 Fling
4 Hyroglyphic illuminations
4 Spirebluff canal
4 Wandering fumerole
4 Ruminap ruins
4 Mountains
6 island
2 Negate
2 Abrade
2 Sweltering suns
4 Fevered visions
2 Chandra, torch of defiance
2 Glorybringer
1 ?
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
Fiery Temper is a huge plus when you are running Lighting Axe, killing a x/3 and a x/5 or a x/8 creature for double red or just kill a creature and bolt your opponent for 3. Getting extra value from Cathartic Reunion is great too.
If you have trouble with control, Glyph Keeper can be good in the side, if they counter or kill it you can Embalm. It naturally has a lot of card advantage attached to a fairly quick evasive clock. Those games are longer and grindy so you can actually afford the cost.
Needs moar Delver.
4 Enigma drake
4 Cryptic serpent
Sorceries
2 Cathartic reunion
4 Strategic planning
2 Insult//injury
instants
4 Shock
4 Lightning axe
3 Censor
2 Fling
4 Firery temper
3 Hyroglyphic illuminations
4 Spirebluff canal
4 Wandering fumerole
8 Mountains
8 island
2 Negate
2 Abrade
2 Incendrary flow
2 Forgot :/
3 Fevered visions
2 Chandra, torch of defiance
2 Glorybringer
Insult to injury was good, censor was meh and I was a little disappointed in the serpent, people seemed to havea lot of chumps for it. but it was a threat that had to be dealt with and can't be pushed.
I won a lot of games off Chandra and glorybringer out of the side to be honest, but the rapid card draw and filtering was great at finding them and the lands to cast them.
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
It is getting some good cards from Ixalan from recent spoilers (Opt, Lightning Strike and Spell Pierce).
The main problem seems to be losing one the UR dual lands in Wandering Fumerole.
You can always use Ramunap Ruins. Been using a playset over Fumarole, and it's working a lot better, since it comes into play untapped.
Then again, my deck is a lot more aggro-focused than most lists I've seen here. I can't post the list now, but it's a UR Prowess with Dispels and Built to Smash (they've been great against damage-based removal), 3 Enigma Drakes and 4 Crash Trough / Slip Through Space / Expedite.
I'll use it on today's event and FNM, against a bunch of Monored and Temur Energy/GB Constrictor. I'll try to post the full list and the results here.
I cut two lands for two tormenting voice, 22 lands. The mulligans could be torturous so I am thinking that was a mistake.. still I won through mulls to 5.
The missing sideboard card above is Chandra's defeat. I replaced the incindary flow with sweltering suns ( Didn't have to face the Werewolves this time but I was ready)
The serpents were much better today. I even managed to slam two into play at times felt good.
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 lightning axe, -4 firery temper.
+4 Opt +4 Lightning strike
I like simiplicity the first week.
And the land I haven't worked out yet and I need some anti slow midrange/control card to replace fevered visions maybe Search for Azcanta? It is easy to flip in this deck or perhaps riddleform does that job well as well.
I have been very supirsed about how strong insult // injury is, can be pitched and used as removal or can just amp an attack for a win. I think it is stronger than the flip artifact.
I have not wanted any unsummon effects, my creatures are almost always bigger than my opponents, essence scatter seems better because glorybringer is scary.
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
Looking at a lot of the articles going around. Have we thought about chart a course? Basically a better tormenting voice in blue.
I think without firery temper I can push the deck much more blue than red.
Hmm yeah hazoret has killed me a bunch but typically start swinging for 10 by the time they empty thier hand it has to kill me the turn it comes out basically. Overall though unsummon is typically not good against haste creatures like this, it isn't getting its full tempo boost it normally does.
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