MTG Salvation

The numbers have changed somewhat and the deck is put together in paper after some more testing online.
Can't wait to take it to FNM next week.



It's pretty calm in this thread.

Calm is a nice word. I did a lot of limited and was hoping to open some Bolases, but alas. The list seems solid. I wanted to give you some feedback from playing with Bolas, rather than only against.

If you need an early Abrade, it could be a little awkward, but Push is fine against Heart. Eschewing Canyon Slough explains the lack of Whirler Virtuoso also.

I do think that a Torrential Gearhulk or two would be worth considering in a vacuum, but I imagine you know your meta. I do want to hear your post-mortem analysis of running 4 Bolases. It seems like a lot, but people are running that many. Good luck!

Nicol Bolas, Tha Ravager is just that good. Excess copies xan be pitched and otherwise they are a 4cmc discard spell which is reasonable sometimes. I want to see one, sometimes more a game, every game. They have a giant target on their back. I can understand why people would run 3 and add Torrential Gearhulk. It's awesome in a deck like this, I just don't own any copies and am not planning to buy into them. So if i can't trade into one or two i probably won't run them.

Whirler Virtuoso is a risky proposition. The energy package is trimmed down and the meta.... well Goblin Chainwhirler. The tokens just don't seem to grind as far as they did before.

To be honest, i'm really questioning the reasons to ban several energy staples, since the meta from dominaria and on could probably deal with it very easilly.

Been seeing a lot of lists pop up, and I have to say they're reminiscent of the Jund decks that dominated standard during Alara/Zendikar rotation. You just have a really sweet spell at every single spot in the curve. Unfortunately, instead of a Putrid Leech at the 2-drop slot to stonewall other aggressive creatures in combat, or to eat a removal spell like a vitamin after blocks + pumps, you have Glint-Sleeve Siphoner, who is actually at its best against control and other midrange strategies.

I feel that by default, Whirler Virtuoso is just a necessary evil for game one scenarios. Because your early threats are rather squishy, you need some extra padding to make it through to the later turns in the game. I just finished a MTG Arena queue in which I took a game white Virtuoso + Siphoner triggers to help me tempo a Heart of Kiran. It really shouldn't get blown out by Chainwhirler enough for that to be a pressing concern... but it does shine in a lot of situations where other cards might not give you enough coverage.

My current list in testing:



(Update: -1 Negate/-1 The Eldest Reborn in SB for +2 By Force
Making hedges in concession to the Mono-U Outcome combo archetype. Need extra gas for their midgame)

The entire deckbuilding philosophy is to have every spell affect the board state in game one to avoid losses to any aggressive strategies. This is also why I have the legendary spells at a 3-3-1 split between Nicol Bolas/Scarab God/Liliana. I sprinkled in the Noxious Gearhulk to make for a quasi midrange-breaker and so far it has been putting in work. You need some kind of value to have your Scarab God activations and Liliana -3 pay off in the end

What I need more data against is G/b Midrange. They're why I stuck with Hour of Devastation in the board. Hard to really tell whether it is going to cut it against what they bring to the table, especially since they can sometimes grow their threats out of Hour range by means of pump spell

Not a fan of the "energy package", though Glint-Sleeve is good enough on its own to deserve a slot. Feels like this deck just wants to be UB Midrange with Bolas + Abrade.

In regard to the above mentioned Green decks, be very afraid of Vine Mare. It demands an answer. Yahenni's Expertise, Hour of Devastation, or River's Rebuke are must haves in your SB.

Quote from The Decepticon »

Not a fan of the "energy package", though Glint-Sleeve is good enough on its own to deserve a slot. Feels like this deck just wants to be UB Midrange with Bolas + Abrade.

Yes, this is what i'm trying to run and it works great.
I'm not a fan of the very heavy red splash and the manabase that comes with it. 4 taplands is ok to start the game with. 8 is way too much for my liking. Maybe after rotation this gets more interesting since a Nicol Bolas, the Ravager build requires so much after that.

In regard to the above mentioned Green decks, be very afraid of Vine Mare. It demands an answer. Yahenni's Expertise, Hour of Devastation, or River's Rebuke are must haves in your SB.

Vine Mare the new Bristling Hydra. Yes this card is very good and i run a couple of copies in the maindeck of another brew i'm working on. Post rotation it'll be absolutely worth it.

I have a feelinng though, that UW control will still be around, and this deck just preys on creature decks. 1for1 trades at 4 mana aren't the end of the world. even 5 mana would be acceptable for them.

Has anyone tried a transformative sideboard?

This is the decklist I am currently running:



Yet I was thinking about making a transformative sideboard to have a little fun with people. something like

Sideboard 2
4Glint Sleeve Siphoner
4Champion of Wits
2GloryBringer
3Duress
2Negate

I think it would actually do quite well, maybe instead of 4 Chapion of Wits andGlint Sleeve Siphoner you could add a couple ofRavenous Chupacabra against red. It would be hilarious against control, they side out all their removal to be slapped in the face with midrange haha.

What do yall think?

Ravenous Chupacabra is not playable in this deck. If you want to kill a creature there are much better things on curve for the job, like Vraska's Contempt. If you want value versus aggro, play low-curve removal in bunches. The deck plays like Junk, it doesn't really need Ravenous unless you have G/b midrange in your sights, then I can understand 1 or 2 in the board. Even then it's loose

Quote from VoodooKick »

Ravenous Chupacabra is not playable in this deck.

neither is cancel. Id be concerned with any deck needing UU+RR+BB for its spells

Lol so disallow in the umpteen thousand decklists I've seen is also unplayable? The Mana base works fine, uu/bb/rr is easy as hell to obtain. I only run cancel as I'm a cheap ass and don't wanna spend any more money.

Also there are 4 vraska in the main. If you're playing against red a 2 for one with chupacabra is great. Kill a creature and a body to block.

Quote from 9ta!lz »

Lol so disallow in the umpteen thousand decklists I've seen is also unplayable? The Mana base works fine, uu/bb/rr is easy as hell to obtain. I only run cancel as I'm a cheap ass and don't wanna spend any more money.

Also there are 4 vraska in the main. If you're playing against red a 2 for one with chupacabra is great. Kill a creature and a body to block.

Cancel isnt Disallow.....but I wouldnt run Disallow in Grixis either. Vs Red Id rather have Extraction/Aetherborn/Contempt.

In the sense that it is a hard counter for 1uu it is.

If you're running field of ruins, side it out for the detection tower. but yeah, there isn't a whole lot we can do about the Mares, siding in sweltering suns can work. Hour of devastation works as well, but both will more than likely clear your board at that point in time or will be too late.

Has anyone tried running Dreamstealer in place of Champion of wits ? I've been play testing it and it's great. Aggro if they don't answer it either a because they answered your siphoner, or B because they don't have an answer, you're slowing them down very quickly in the card advantage department. A lot of times I find myself not wanting to cast champion as I don't want to discard anything to it. Late game eternalize or scarab god a dreamstealer against anything is just absolutely punishing.

Quote from 9ta!lz »

Has anyone tried running Dreamstealer in place of Champion of wits ? I've been play testing it and it's great. Aggro if they don't answer it either a because they answered your siphoner, or B because they don't have an answer, you're slowing them down very quickly in the card advantage department. A lot of times I find myself not wanting to cast champion as I don't want to discard anything to it. Late game eternalize or scarab god a dreamstealer against anything is just absolutely punishing.

could be an interesting 1 of somewhere but i prefer duress & champion to it

in regard to vine mare, expertise, last reckoning, rebuke, suns or a magic christmasland empty board doomfall are what youre working with

Quote from KLT »

I recently realized Yahenni's Expertise might not be the correct solution. If they have a Blossoming Defense to grow the horse above 3 toughness that's probably GG. I'm trying out some Bontu's Last Reckoning instead. The not-untapping lands clause is severe but I expect monoG to need some time to rebuild as well so I'll probably be ready for the next onslaught.

tbf, i dont think there is a "correct" solution to the Vinemare problem. Feels like a lose/lose scenario. Expertise doesnt take care of a lot of other creatures green decks are packing. Same with Sweltering. Bontu doesnt deal with Rhonas (though Contempt does), and taking turns off is almost always bad. Im to the point where Ive actually been trying out Vizier of Many Faces

Quote from The Decepticon »

Quote from KLT »

I recently realized Yahenni's Expertise might not be the correct solution. If they have a Blossoming Defense to grow the horse above 3 toughness that's probably GG. I'm trying out some Bontu's Last Reckoning instead. The not-untapping lands clause is severe but I expect monoG to need some time to rebuild as well so I'll probably be ready for the next onslaught.

tbf, i dont think there is a "correct" solution to the Vinemare problem. Feels like a lose/lose scenario. Expertise doesnt take care of a lot of other creatures green decks are packing. Same with Sweltering. Bontu doesnt deal with Rhonas (though Contempt does), and taking turns off is almost always bad. Im to the point where Ive actually been trying out Vizier of Many Faces

Vizier is cool, and the card everyone says is terrible aka detection tower in the SB is amazing vs vinemare. Side out that field of ruin.

I updated this and took it to a Store Championship. After stumbling on mana and then punting away match 1 against GB Stompy, I beat angels, a G brew and Knights for 3-1 and third. Deck was good. Feedback welcome, as I plan to take it to another Store Championship.

So, come rotation, how would you guys fill the gaps since obviously we need to part from the reanimation plan?
I feel there are a ton of proactive discard options and a faster manabase to back it up from turn 1.
We can discard cards while developing our board from T1 to T4.
I'm working on a rough draft and will post asap.

I'm jumping back into standard post guilds. I'm curious to see where this goes. I was thinking instead of the reanimation suite, we use ionize, mission breifing shenanigans?

Shooting from the hip (spoilers), Grixis seems spell-based and controlling. I imagine it to be more interested in Sinister Sabotage than Ionize. I think Jeskai or Izzet might be a tempo deck that prefers Ionize. OTOH, Mission Briefing + Sinister Sabotage needs UUUU, so I could be wrong or Grixis might want a mix.

I do have a preference for midrange creature decks, so I am leaning toward playing G at rotation. I would love for somebody (Smaug?) to start a new Grixis thread that would take over post-rotation when this thread gets archived. Edit: Oops, we already have a post-rotation Grixis Control thread. So we could use a post-rotation Midrange thread is someone thinks it's viable, but I don't want to inspire a second Grixis Control thread.

Edit 2: Apparently, my memory sucks. There is already a post-rotation Grixis Midrange thread also (that I have even contributed to!), so I would encourage people to contribute there and we don't need more threads, just more posts.

This thread is just for pre-rotation Grixis, if anybody still cares. Maybe I should lock it?

I feel you, it's Grixis or Sultai for my "big deck" too.