Trying to fight against the old Delirium lists is very painful for Tower control decks for the reasons pixel listed - they're very strong against damage-based removal, they have a lot of discard that neuters the effectiveness of the control plan in general, and they have huge beaters that can present a very fast clock once online. Whereas constrictor-focused decks we're an underdog but can beat, Delirium is just a slog that's very unlikely to end well no matter how you prepare for it, short of having a transformational sideboard to go into Temur Pummeler or something aggro.
As far as the GB Constrictor decks, there are a lot of ways to work through it. Incendiary Flow is a great card to nuke snakes, and Niblis of Frost is just an AMAZING countercall because it locks down their board with very little they can do about it - if you can protect it then it should win games by itself, especially if they cut fatal push expecting nothing but gearhulks. Be sure to save countermagic for their bombs though - don't bother disallowing a ballista trigger, save it for a gearhulk.
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I've seen a lot of lists with Brutal Expulsion but it hasn't been very good for me, is there something I'm missing? I understand that, in the best possible scenario, it's effectively Time Walk that also exiles a Scrounger. The floor of making your opponent tap a couple extra lands is very low though. It was one of the first things I cut, but I see it cropping up in sideboards so it's clearly punishing something specific. I guess you could bounce Gideon and kill his token? Tapping out to buy another turn doesn't seem that potent. It stops CopyCat, but for 4x the cost of Shock...
Pixel: I'm not sure why Brutal Expulsion is seeing so much play either, and it's weird that I'm seeing decks play 2 maindeck copies with a 3rd (or even 4th) in the board. My best guess is that the idea of Unsubstantiate with shock attached, which I suppose is okay-ish but I feel we have better cards to run in its place.
I also note that the deck that won GP Puerto Alegre was playing 0 Brutal expulsion, but he's also running 0 shock, 1 anticipate, 2 horribly awry and 3 maindeck Kosilek's Return. I will concede that Horribly Awry does fairly well against Snake and Guardian, but I'm still not sold.
Top 16 - 2012 Indiana State Championships Currently Playing: GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
The reason (imo) that the Alegre deck played Kozilek's Return over Radiant Flames is that instant speed mass removal > sorcery speed mass removal, even with the damage difference. It allowed him to repeatedly catch activated vehicles to kill the creatures and then finish the vehicles themselves off with a tower.
Pixel: I'm not sure why Brutal Expulsion is seeing so much play either, and it's weird that I'm seeing decks play 2 maindeck copies with a 3rd (or even 4th) in the board. My best guess is that the idea of Unsubstantiate with shock attached, which I suppose is okay-ish but I feel we have better cards to run in its place.
I also note that the deck that won GP Puerto Alegre was playing 0 Brutal expulsion, but he's also running 0 shock, 1 anticipate, 2 horribly awry and 3 maindeck Kosilek's Return. I will concede that Horribly Awry does fairly well against Snake and Guardian, but I'm still not sold.
EDIT: how the hell did I forget Harnessed Lightning? fixed that.
Shizuoka was like 5x the size of Alegre though, I'm really intrigued by those Expulsions lol. Tireless Trackers in the sideboard seems to have caught on universally so I'll have to invest in a couple.
Your list looks solid as is, but I have a few ideas that might help tighten it up. You have a lot of 6-drops that could leave you with some really slow draws, I would cut at least one. I tried Chandra for a while because I wanted a main deck sweeper that was also good against control but I found she was often too slow to stop a blitz. You should probably bite the bullet and just run proper sweepers since you know they're good against 4c CopyCat and Mardu Vehicles. Random R/B, Humans, or RDW decks will have fewer free wins against you too. You mentioned that the Alegre deck didn't run any Shocks and I've been considering cutting back as well, I think three is definitely too many. The sweepers will clean up the usual targets for an easy value play, and once you stick a Tower against CopyCat you're probably just going to dome the opponent for 2. I'm at two copies for now but only because I'm OCD and not a fan of main deck singletons generally, it's probably correct to just play one like Shota's original list.
I don't like the Disallow/Void Shatter split myself, Voidslime saw some modern play whereas Void Shatter could never be good enough. While this is a different context, to me the flexibility and power level of Disallow is so much higher I can't pass it up to catch a late game Scrounger or deny a future Gearhulk his Glimmer. Splitting them down the middle is the coward's way out lol, if anything maybe 4 Disallow main and Void Shatter(s) in the sideboard (I have seen some lists with 5-6 hard counters in the 75 lately). Speaking of the sideboard, I don't think you want four copies of Incendiary Flow total since it's more of a main deck hedge that exiles Scrounger and has some game against the other decks. What you really want is something more focused and instant speed like Natural Obsolescence (for Mardu) or Horribly Awry (for B/G and 4c CopyCat). We might be interested in Aether Meltdown too but I haven't tested it yet. I did test Niblis of Frost for a while and it was great, but it sort of competes with Confiscation Coup because of the cost. If you bring in two of each your curve will start to get top heavy, so unless you are boarding out Gearhulks you might want to trim one or the other. Personally I prefer Coup because it's harder to answer and works on artifacts like Marvel, but Niblis does its job against G/B beautifully.
@Springlake: I think Kozilek's Return is better against Mardu and Radiant Flames is better against 4c CopyCat, both are serviceable so it just depends on which you expect to face more. Mardu is played less on MTGO because it's so expensive, so I definitely encounter more CopyCat decks and it's nice to have a clean answer to Whirler Virtuoso. If a Mardu player was crazy enough to cash Gideon in for an emblem Return would look pretty silly, so there's that to consider too. 4/3 Scrounger army would be quite the beating lol.
Chandra has been just amazing, I don't think I've lost a game when she's resolved. Yes she's expensive and yes the deck is already a bit top-heavy but she's the main way for the deck to bust up a stalled board and shorten a match that would likely otherwise go to turns. I'll cut one of the copies of shock for a 23rd land to help that.
After thinking about it, you're absolutely correct about the disallow/void shatter split. Just run a full playset of disallow and accept that I have to use them very sparingly against decks iwth lots of creatures. I'll replace the two SB incendiary flow with void shatter to get to that 6 hard counter number though.
I still prefer radiant flames over kozilek's return because the 3rd point of damage is relevant, and we have no way to flashback return for the 5 damage sweep anyway.
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I took Temur Tower out for a spin at GPNJ and it just didn't work for me. I still like the idea of Tower, though, so I'll be trying out the following Grixis build next time I get a chance, with fingers crossed for some exciting new additions with Amonkhet. Thoughts?
Still tweaking and working on the sideboard. Looking at a pair of Noxious Gearhulks, a handful of situational counterspells, another 1-2 Radiant Flames and probably 2 Lost Legacy.
Has anyone tried a 4-color Tower build? I'd love to include both Attune with Aether and Fatal Push/Unlicensed Disintegration but I worry it would make the UU costs harder to meet.
Pixel has been playing around with a black splash (1 fastland, 1 swamp) to enable unlicensed disintegration but I still think it's a bit too shaky. Attune with Aether is good enough that USUALLY color screw isn't a problem, but without it I don't think 3-color is viable, and even with it I'm not sure 4-color is viable.
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I've been going back and forth on it lately. I think Unlicensed Disintegration (and To The Slaughter) are the best answers for this metagame and the mana has been fine for me, but with Towers and counterspells (also sweepers/Refiners*/Virtuosos) the 3cmc slot is overcrowded. Things get especially murky when you're weighing Unlicensed Disintegration against your fourth Disallow. Lately I've been taking a harder look at my mana curve post-sideboard and seeing how what I want to bring in lines up against what I'd like to board out. For example against B/G I'm prioritizing being able to swap out my Negates for more 2cmc answers like Horribly Awry instead of just loading up on Niblis/Coup/Disintegration.
I wouldn't run Fatal Push in 4c Tower though, you won't be prioritizing black mana sources early and the deck doesn't have any way to trigger Revolt.
In the long term I plan to move into Grixis myself since we're expecting a Bolas planeswalker in those colors. Attune With Aether is a great complement to Tower but green doesn't offer us much else, these colors want us to play tempo not control. Hopefully there will be enough incentive to drop Attune. I faced a very interesting Grixis deck a while back that used Hope of Ghirapur and Mindwrack Demon to enable Delirium for their To The Slaughters. HoG is actually pretty evil in the control mirror, if you can't deal with it right away it will needle you for 2-3 damage then Time Walk you while they cast Glimmer of Genius with impunity. There could be something there.
While I agree that black does give us a lot of potential upside (not the least of which is having access to a Bolas walker) I am concerned about the mana - with what we currently have, wedge mana is a lot easier to support than shards (see Mardu Karz and GB Snake usually splashing white or blue instead of red)
Obviously this might change based on what kind of dual lands we get in Amonkhet, but let's not put the cart before the horse until we get some more spoilers.
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I actually keep three different builds for testing: Shota's original list as a control, my greedy 4c list, and an updated "clean" Temur list. Most of my real tuning starts with the latter because it runs more copies of fewer cards, making it more consistent and easier to see the pros and cons of the changes I make. I have it pretty dialed in and I really like the sideboard plans so it has started to overtake 4c as my preferred build. I'll share where I'm at with it:
The sideboarding is very straightforward and largely "modular" based on CMC to maintain the curve
Mardu Vehicles
-4 Disallow
-2 Bristling Hydra
+2 Whirler Virtuoso
+2 Shielded Aether Thief
+1 Negate
+1 Natural Obsolescence
Seems to me that you are bringing in Shielded Aether Thief in every single matchup. Any reasons to NOT just play them in the main to begin with?
Same with you bringing out Bristling Hydra against everything that isn't the mirror. If you are going to keep bringing them out in nearly every matchup, why not just keep them in the sideboard to begin with?
Springlake has a point. If you're bringing in aether theif every game it makes sense to just have it in the main. Also if you're cutting Hydra every time it seems to make sense to bring it in against the mirror instead of having to always cut it.
I went 2-2 today, played Mardu Carz thrice (won once) and won against grixis tower. I very much screwed up my boarding plan and I'm pretty sure it hurt me quite a bit, and I also super-punted a game by poor land sequencing allowing my opponent to land a turn 4 gideon after turn 3 heart of kiran.
I still think we're in an okay position going forward, though the addition of the cycling duals presents an interesting reason to consider shifting to Grixis.
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I notice a lot of the decks playing x2 Narnam Renegade, x4 Longtusk Cub, and x4 Tireless Tracker. I get Tireless Tracker, but in what matchups are we bringing in 10 creatures? It isn't making sense to me in almost any matchup.
What does grixis present better than URG in terms of cycle lands?
I'm guessing because you can play two sets (UB and BR) instead of one (GR). I doubt you'd want to run so many of them that it would be a major factor though.
Speaking of which, tried out a Grixis Tower build this afternoon. I definitely need to practice the deck, lost a couple of games due to misplays. Still not sure if it's truly viable, it seems to have a lot of trouble stabilizing without the extra energy from Attune.
I'm currently playing just U/R control, thinking to change to Temur, not sure if gives me so much advantage...
My deck has been really great against other control decks, but not so good against mardu and bg. It's really hard when they resolve a Gideon or when BG comes too aggressive, it's hard to remove their creatures. I will try to change some small things on the main board before choosing to change
definitely to Temur.
Seems to me that you are bringing in Shielded Aether Thief in every single matchup. Any reasons to NOT just play them in the main to begin with?
Same with you bringing out Bristling Hydra against everything that isn't the mirror. If you are going to keep bringing them out in nearly every matchup, why not just keep them in the sideboard to begin with?
In game one your opponent will have all of their removal. If your only other targets are Gearhulks, Shielded Aether Thief tends to soak up an otherwise dead Fatal Push leaving you with zero value and negative tempo. I'm trying to keep their removal as dead as possible until they sideboard most of it out. The same reasoning applies to the Bristling Hydras - they're additional win conditions (and ways to pressure planeswalkers) that don't turn on opposing removal, with the added bonus of suckerpunching other control players that can't get a blocker in front of them. There aren't many matchups where a pumpable "unkillable" creature is truly bad so they're passable for the main deck, they just lack evasion so they're not very effective at attacking through tokens (which is why I swap them for something far more targeted, like Dampening Pulse).
I will be running (for now) Victor Silvas Temur Tower deck (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/597934#online) but my meta doesn't have a ton of Mardu Vehicles. I need help tweaking it for a meta with control and a bit of BG Delirium/Counters.
Against B/G I found the deck was pretty dominant, Tower does a lot of good work. Horribly Awry and Harnessed Lightning being your best tools early. Kozilek's Return not great, as many games are about killing Winding Constrictor ASAP, since that is the most problematic card until Verdurous Gearhulk shows up. I'd say if you are worried about B/G in particular, cutting 1 or 2 copies of K Return, 1 or 2 copies of Negate, and adding 1 or 2 copies of Incediary Flow and a copy of Confiscation Coup is a good place to start. Horribly Awry and Void Shatter also go up in value against Delirium builds.
Been testing against Mardu this week, gearing up for the next tourney, I thought I'd share a couple findings:
On the draw, Kozilek's Return is key. That and Negate. Basically you can't allow Gideon to resolve until you are ready to Gearhulk or have a Tower with a good pool of . So leaving up "Counterspells"/Return is the best way to deny Gideon while hedging against other possible plays (Thalia, Scrounger, Exemplar, Inspector, Motorist, Ballista) and potentially cleaning up their turn 1 and turn 2 plays. In the late game, Torrential Gearhulk can flashback the Return to kill Knight Allies and any other blockers and give you clean attacks against a resolved Gideon.
Longtusk Cub is legit. I have been stealing many post-board games with Longtusk Cub on the play. I haven't been using it on the draw, but cub + Negate hands steal games on the play. I have yet to see an opponent keep in Fatal Push post-sideboard against Tower. Cub gets to run amok. Their answers are basically: Nahiri and Disintegration (Chandra also works if she shows up on curve). Sometimes turn 2 cub, protect cub is all you need to do to win.
Love the deck, and I will be playing it at least until Amonkhet drops.
I like that Aether Meltdown takes care of Scroungers at instant speed without going deep on Natural Obsolescence, but I don't like that it allows Winding Constrictor to keep doing its thing. Are you boarding those out against G/B?
Is there a reason that build runs Narnam Renegade over Gnarlwood Dryad? I feel like this deck has a better chance of triggering Delirium than Revolt, not that it would come up often either way. I suppose Renegade could eat some Servos with that extra toughness, but still...
Went 3-1 tonight running a carbon copy of Pixel's list in Post 124 with the exception of chandra flamecaller in the board in place of the 4th negate. Here's a brief report:
R1 VS Mardu Vehicles
Game 1 he lands a turn 2 heart of kiran, but thanks to him never finding gideon and me keeping his board clean he never manages to get 3 power's worth of creatures to actually crew it. Game 2 he gets a near perfect hand and my 3 land opener fizzles, game 3 he plays a gideon, baits out a counter then plays a second gideon he'd been sandbagging since opening hand. I flash in a gearhulk but am only at 4 life. He makes a knight and passes, makes a second knight and passes, makes a 3rd knight and passes - his dice had me at 5 life and he didn't swing lethal. I topdeck chandra, -2 her, and win from there.
R2 VS 4Color Copycat
Game 1 he gets Saheeli but I have plenty of answers to keep him from ever dropping the cat, eventually I get there with 7 dynavolt blasts. Game 2 he gets color screwed off red and after I counter two attune with aether he just scoops.
R3 VS UB Tezzerator
Game 1 I run into all manner of weirdness and just flood out, never draw a single gearhulk as he finds 3 of his alongside Liliana, the Last Hope, Tezzeret the Schemer, and Ob Nixilis Reignited. Game 2 he floods out and despite a tezz emblem I keep him from having any artifacts to animate, and a timely confiscation coup seals it. Game 3 I disallow tezz's ultimate twice before riding a gearhulk to victory.
R4 VS 4Color Copycat
Game 1 I go full lockdown and never give him an opportunity to resolve either combo piece while lumbering falls applied the beatdown. Game 2 I tap out for turn 4 dampening pulse. His response on turn 5 is to play chandra, torch of defiance, use her second +1 for RR plus his land for turn for Saheeli Rai to copy his rogue refiner to get two more energy and draw a card. That plus the 3 felidar guardians in hand plus me flooding allowed him to kill throught DP. Game 3 he gets the god hand and combos turn 4 with dispel backup from Servant of the Conduit.
I still really like the deck and would feel confident taking it to a bigger event should one open up, though I really wonder how much a drain it would be on the pilot compared to an aggro deck. Every match tonight ended with less than 5 minutes on the clock.
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Seems to me that you are bringing in Shielded Aether Thief in every single matchup. Any reasons to NOT just play them in the main to begin with?
Same with you bringing out Bristling Hydra against everything that isn't the mirror. If you are going to keep bringing them out in nearly every matchup, why not just keep them in the sideboard to begin with?
Springlake has a point. If you're bringing in aether theif every game it makes sense to just have it in the main. Also if you're cutting Hydra every time it seems to make sense to bring it in against the mirror instead of having to always cut it.
I went 2-2 today, played Mardu Carz thrice (won once) and won against grixis tower. I very much screwed up my boarding plan and I'm pretty sure it hurt me quite a bit, and I also super-punted a game by poor land sequencing allowing my opponent to land a turn 4 gideon after turn 3 heart of kiran.
I still think we're in an okay position going forward, though the addition of the cycling duals presents an interesting reason to consider shifting to Grixis.
I think it is a common misconception among many players that "If you are bringing in 4x of [Card] in every matchup, you should just play it in the mainboard"
Sideboarded games are very different. This means that [Card]'s performance in sideboarded games will usually be different than in mainboard games (assuming your opponent has a sideboard). In Temur Tower's case, most opponents will board out a large portion of their removal (especially those that can't hit gearhulk such as fatal push) in order to bring in more disruption like dispel, transgress the mind, possibly artifact removal like natural obseclescence and release the gremlins, which means shielded aether thief (or other creatures like longtusk cub) will always be better in sideboarded games than mainboard game. I believe this is also the reason why Temur Tower with Longtusk Cub sideboard won the GP, he was bringing in 4 of them in almost every matchup because he was sure that his opponents would board out fatal push and none of his opponents could imagine that Temur Tower would play Longtusk Cub in the sideboard. The value of Longtusk Cub here was much better in sideboarded games than mainboard games.
Tommy, now that I take the time to reflect on your post I agree with the analysis. We're not playing our board against their main, we're playing our board against theirs. They are going to make calls based on not only what we run in the main, but what we're bringing in from our board.
To that end, I think that longtusk cub loses value now that it's a known thing - people will board out a little less removal so as to not get tusked to death. Whirler Virtuoso I think is better now because even if they push it immediately we can generate a few thopters to harry our opponents.
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Hello. I've recently got back into Magic and bought into UR Tower/control shell to have something to tinker with for FMNs and such. I want to test a lot of different builds on this base. Funny to think this is the first standard legal deck I fully own since 2004 Then I played a lot of extended Tog in Ravnica days, so draw-go is probably something I subconsciously leant towards once again.
While I'm still aquiring missing singles and thinking of style I want to build towards, I see overwhelming majority of decklists are Temur Towers featuring the only green set of Attune with Aether in main. I wonder does this card alone really make a world of difference to play a third color, or is green mainly added for sideboard techs?
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Standard: UR Like grixis midrange but worse
Modern: UR Bloo
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As far as the GB Constrictor decks, there are a lot of ways to work through it. Incendiary Flow is a great card to nuke snakes, and Niblis of Frost is just an AMAZING countercall because it locks down their board with very little they can do about it - if you can protect it then it should win games by itself, especially if they cut fatal push expecting nothing but gearhulks. Be sure to save countermagic for their bombs though - don't bother disallowing a ballista trigger, save it for a gearhulk.
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I also note that the deck that won GP Puerto Alegre was playing 0 Brutal expulsion, but he's also running 0 shock, 1 anticipate, 2 horribly awry and 3 maindeck Kosilek's Return. I will concede that Horribly Awry does fairly well against Snake and Guardian, but I'm still not sold.
In any case this is the deck I've put together:
4 Torrential Gearhulk
Artifacts (4)
4 Dynavolt Tower
Sorceries (6)
4 Attune with Aether
2 Incendiary Flow
Instants (23)
3 Shock
4 Anticipate
3 Negate
4 Harnessed Lightning
1 Natural Obsolescence
3 Disallow
1 Void Shatter
4 Glimmer of Genius
1 Chandra, Flamecaller
Lands (22)
4 Aether Hub
4 Botanical Sanctum
3 Forest
3 Island
2 Lumbering Falls
2 Mountain
4 Spirebluff Canal
2 Bristling Hydra
2 Niblis of Frost
2 Radiant Flames
2 Dampening Pulse
2 Dispel
2 Confiscation Coup
2 Incendiary Flow
1 Natural Obsolescence
Thoughts?
EDIT: how the hell did I forget Harnessed Lightning? fixed that.
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Shizuoka was like 5x the size of Alegre though, I'm really intrigued by those Expulsions lol. Tireless Trackers in the sideboard seems to have caught on universally so I'll have to invest in a couple.
Your list looks solid as is, but I have a few ideas that might help tighten it up. You have a lot of 6-drops that could leave you with some really slow draws, I would cut at least one. I tried Chandra for a while because I wanted a main deck sweeper that was also good against control but I found she was often too slow to stop a blitz. You should probably bite the bullet and just run proper sweepers since you know they're good against 4c CopyCat and Mardu Vehicles. Random R/B, Humans, or RDW decks will have fewer free wins against you too. You mentioned that the Alegre deck didn't run any Shocks and I've been considering cutting back as well, I think three is definitely too many. The sweepers will clean up the usual targets for an easy value play, and once you stick a Tower against CopyCat you're probably just going to dome the opponent for 2. I'm at two copies for now but only because I'm OCD and not a fan of main deck singletons generally, it's probably correct to just play one like Shota's original list.
I don't like the Disallow/Void Shatter split myself, Voidslime saw some modern play whereas Void Shatter could never be good enough. While this is a different context, to me the flexibility and power level of Disallow is so much higher I can't pass it up to catch a late game Scrounger or deny a future Gearhulk his Glimmer. Splitting them down the middle is the coward's way out lol, if anything maybe 4 Disallow main and Void Shatter(s) in the sideboard (I have seen some lists with 5-6 hard counters in the 75 lately). Speaking of the sideboard, I don't think you want four copies of Incendiary Flow total since it's more of a main deck hedge that exiles Scrounger and has some game against the other decks. What you really want is something more focused and instant speed like Natural Obsolescence (for Mardu) or Horribly Awry (for B/G and 4c CopyCat). We might be interested in Aether Meltdown too but I haven't tested it yet. I did test Niblis of Frost for a while and it was great, but it sort of competes with Confiscation Coup because of the cost. If you bring in two of each your curve will start to get top heavy, so unless you are boarding out Gearhulks you might want to trim one or the other. Personally I prefer Coup because it's harder to answer and works on artifacts like Marvel, but Niblis does its job against G/B beautifully.
@Springlake: I think Kozilek's Return is better against Mardu and Radiant Flames is better against 4c CopyCat, both are serviceable so it just depends on which you expect to face more. Mardu is played less on MTGO because it's so expensive, so I definitely encounter more CopyCat decks and it's nice to have a clean answer to Whirler Virtuoso. If a Mardu player was crazy enough to cash Gideon in for an emblem Return would look pretty silly, so there's that to consider too. 4/3 Scrounger army would be quite the beating lol.
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After thinking about it, you're absolutely correct about the disallow/void shatter split. Just run a full playset of disallow and accept that I have to use them very sparingly against decks iwth lots of creatures. I'll replace the two SB incendiary flow with void shatter to get to that 6 hard counter number though.
I still prefer radiant flames over kozilek's return because the 3rd point of damage is relevant, and we have no way to flashback return for the 5 damage sweep anyway.
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3 Torrential Gearhulk
Artifacts (4)
4 Dynavolt Tower
Sorceries (2)
1 Dark Intimations
1 Radiant Flames
Instants (26)
2 Shock
4 Anticipate
2 Fatal Push
4 Harnessed Lightning
3 Negate
2 Disallow
4 Unlicensed Disintegration
1 Void Shatter
4 Glimmer of Genius
4 Aether Hub
4 Evolving Wilds
3 Island
3 Mountain
2 Spirebluff Canal
4 Sunken Hollow
3 Swamp
2 Wandering Fumarole
Still tweaking and working on the sideboard. Looking at a pair of Noxious Gearhulks, a handful of situational counterspells, another 1-2 Radiant Flames and probably 2 Lost Legacy.
Has anyone tried a 4-color Tower build? I'd love to include both Attune with Aether and Fatal Push/Unlicensed Disintegration but I worry it would make the UU costs harder to meet.
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I wouldn't run Fatal Push in 4c Tower though, you won't be prioritizing black mana sources early and the deck doesn't have any way to trigger Revolt.
In the long term I plan to move into Grixis myself since we're expecting a Bolas planeswalker in those colors. Attune With Aether is a great complement to Tower but green doesn't offer us much else, these colors want us to play tempo not control. Hopefully there will be enough incentive to drop Attune. I faced a very interesting Grixis deck a while back that used Hope of Ghirapur and Mindwrack Demon to enable Delirium for their To The Slaughters. HoG is actually pretty evil in the control mirror, if you can't deal with it right away it will needle you for 2-3 damage then Time Walk you while they cast Glimmer of Genius with impunity. There could be something there.
Esper Control
Obviously this might change based on what kind of dual lands we get in Amonkhet, but let's not put the cart before the horse until we get some more spoilers.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
2 Bristling Hydra
3 Torrential Gearhulk
Spells 29
4 Attune with Aether
2 Shock
4 Harnessed Lightning
3 Anticipate
3 Negate
2 Incendiary Flow
1 Natural Obsolescence
4 Disallow
2 Radiant Flames
4 Glimmer of Genius
4 Dynavolt Tower
Lands 22
4 Aether Hub
4 Botanical Sanctum
4 Spirebluff Canal
2 Lumbering Falls
3 Island
4 Forest
1 Mountain
2 Dispel
2 Shielded Aether Thief
1 Natural Obsolescence
1 Negate
1 Horribly Awry
2 Whirler Virtuoso
2 Dampening Pulse
2 Summary Dismissal
2 Confiscation Coup
The sideboarding is very straightforward and largely "modular" based on CMC to maintain the curve
Mardu Vehicles
-4 Disallow
-2 Bristling Hydra
+2 Whirler Virtuoso
+2 Shielded Aether Thief
+1 Negate
+1 Natural Obsolescence
4c CopyCat
-2 Bristling Hydra
-2 Incendiary Flow
-1 Natural Obsolescence
+2 Dampening Pulse
+2 Shielded Aether Thief
+1 Horribly Awry
G/B Snake
-2 Bristling Hydra
-3 Negate
+2 Confiscation Coup
+2 Shielded Aether Thief
+1 Horribly Awry
Ulamarvel
-2 Bristling Hydra
-2 Incendiary Flow
-2 Shock
+2 Summary Dismissal
+2 Shielded Aether Thief
+1 Negate
+1 Horribly Awry
Mirror
-2 Radiant Flames
-2 Incendiary Flow
-2 Harnessed Lightning
-2 Shock
+2 Whirler Virtuoso
+2 Shielded Aether Thief
+1 Negate
+1 Natural Obsolescence
+2 Dispel
Esper Control
Same with you bringing out Bristling Hydra against everything that isn't the mirror. If you are going to keep bringing them out in nearly every matchup, why not just keep them in the sideboard to begin with?
I went 2-2 today, played Mardu Carz thrice (won once) and won against grixis tower. I very much screwed up my boarding plan and I'm pretty sure it hurt me quite a bit, and I also super-punted a game by poor land sequencing allowing my opponent to land a turn 4 gideon after turn 3 heart of kiran.
I still think we're in an okay position going forward, though the addition of the cycling duals presents an interesting reason to consider shifting to Grixis.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
I'm guessing because you can play two sets (UB and BR) instead of one (GR). I doubt you'd want to run so many of them that it would be a major factor though.
Speaking of which, tried out a Grixis Tower build this afternoon. I definitely need to practice the deck, lost a couple of games due to misplays. Still not sure if it's truly viable, it seems to have a lot of trouble stabilizing without the extra energy from Attune.
My deck has been really great against other control decks, but not so good against mardu and bg. It's really hard when they resolve a Gideon or when BG comes too aggressive, it's hard to remove their creatures. I will try to change some small things on the main board before choosing to change
definitely to Temur.
In game one your opponent will have all of their removal. If your only other targets are Gearhulks, Shielded Aether Thief tends to soak up an otherwise dead Fatal Push leaving you with zero value and negative tempo. I'm trying to keep their removal as dead as possible until they sideboard most of it out. The same reasoning applies to the Bristling Hydras - they're additional win conditions (and ways to pressure planeswalkers) that don't turn on opposing removal, with the added bonus of suckerpunching other control players that can't get a blocker in front of them. There aren't many matchups where a pumpable "unkillable" creature is truly bad so they're passable for the main deck, they just lack evasion so they're not very effective at attacking through tokens (which is why I swap them for something far more targeted, like Dampening Pulse).
Esper Control
Been testing against Mardu this week, gearing up for the next tourney, I thought I'd share a couple findings:
On the draw, Kozilek's Return is key. That and Negate. Basically you can't allow Gideon to resolve until you are ready to Gearhulk or have a Tower with a good pool of . So leaving up "Counterspells"/Return is the best way to deny Gideon while hedging against other possible plays (Thalia, Scrounger, Exemplar, Inspector, Motorist, Ballista) and potentially cleaning up their turn 1 and turn 2 plays. In the late game, Torrential Gearhulk can flashback the Return to kill Knight Allies and any other blockers and give you clean attacks against a resolved Gideon.
Longtusk Cub is legit. I have been stealing many post-board games with Longtusk Cub on the play. I haven't been using it on the draw, but cub + Negate hands steal games on the play. I have yet to see an opponent keep in Fatal Push post-sideboard against Tower. Cub gets to run amok. Their answers are basically: Nahiri and Disintegration (Chandra also works if she shows up on curve). Sometimes turn 2 cub, protect cub is all you need to do to win.
Love the deck, and I will be playing it at least until Amonkhet drops.
Is there a reason that build runs Narnam Renegade over Gnarlwood Dryad? I feel like this deck has a better chance of triggering Delirium than Revolt, not that it would come up often either way. I suppose Renegade could eat some Servos with that extra toughness, but still...
Esper Control
R1 VS Mardu Vehicles
Game 1 he lands a turn 2 heart of kiran, but thanks to him never finding gideon and me keeping his board clean he never manages to get 3 power's worth of creatures to actually crew it. Game 2 he gets a near perfect hand and my 3 land opener fizzles, game 3 he plays a gideon, baits out a counter then plays a second gideon he'd been sandbagging since opening hand. I flash in a gearhulk but am only at 4 life. He makes a knight and passes, makes a second knight and passes, makes a 3rd knight and passes - his dice had me at 5 life and he didn't swing lethal. I topdeck chandra, -2 her, and win from there.
R2 VS 4Color Copycat
Game 1 he gets Saheeli but I have plenty of answers to keep him from ever dropping the cat, eventually I get there with 7 dynavolt blasts. Game 2 he gets color screwed off red and after I counter two attune with aether he just scoops.
R3 VS UB Tezzerator
Game 1 I run into all manner of weirdness and just flood out, never draw a single gearhulk as he finds 3 of his alongside Liliana, the Last Hope, Tezzeret the Schemer, and Ob Nixilis Reignited. Game 2 he floods out and despite a tezz emblem I keep him from having any artifacts to animate, and a timely confiscation coup seals it. Game 3 I disallow tezz's ultimate twice before riding a gearhulk to victory.
R4 VS 4Color Copycat
Game 1 I go full lockdown and never give him an opportunity to resolve either combo piece while lumbering falls applied the beatdown. Game 2 I tap out for turn 4 dampening pulse. His response on turn 5 is to play chandra, torch of defiance, use her second +1 for RR plus his land for turn for Saheeli Rai to copy his rogue refiner to get two more energy and draw a card. That plus the 3 felidar guardians in hand plus me flooding allowed him to kill throught DP. Game 3 he gets the god hand and combos turn 4 with dispel backup from Servant of the Conduit.
I still really like the deck and would feel confident taking it to a bigger event should one open up, though I really wonder how much a drain it would be on the pilot compared to an aggro deck. Every match tonight ended with less than 5 minutes on the clock.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
I think it is a common misconception among many players that "If you are bringing in 4x of [Card] in every matchup, you should just play it in the mainboard"
Sideboarded games are very different. This means that [Card]'s performance in sideboarded games will usually be different than in mainboard games (assuming your opponent has a sideboard). In Temur Tower's case, most opponents will board out a large portion of their removal (especially those that can't hit gearhulk such as fatal push) in order to bring in more disruption like dispel, transgress the mind, possibly artifact removal like natural obseclescence and release the gremlins, which means shielded aether thief (or other creatures like longtusk cub) will always be better in sideboarded games than mainboard game. I believe this is also the reason why Temur Tower with Longtusk Cub sideboard won the GP, he was bringing in 4 of them in almost every matchup because he was sure that his opponents would board out fatal push and none of his opponents could imagine that Temur Tower would play Longtusk Cub in the sideboard. The value of Longtusk Cub here was much better in sideboarded games than mainboard games.
To that end, I think that longtusk cub loses value now that it's a known thing - people will board out a little less removal so as to not get tusked to death. Whirler Virtuoso I think is better now because even if they push it immediately we can generate a few thopters to harry our opponents.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
While I'm still aquiring missing singles and thinking of style I want to build towards, I see overwhelming majority of decklists are Temur Towers featuring the only green set of Attune with Aether in main. I wonder does this card alone really make a world of difference to play a third color, or is green mainly added for sideboard techs?
Modern: UR Bloo