Ive noticed people mentioning having issues with Wingmate Roc. Hornet Queen is a great a answer to this. I have been saying and saying how this deck needs Hornet Queen. She is the best big finisher available- she is hard to deal with efficiently if at all, she is great at taking out planeswalkers, she can play partial offense while still playing defense, and completely halt the opponent's offense. She is also just about the only good way to deal with an opposing Prognostic Sphinx. People think the mana cost is prohibitive, but if you can cast Courser on turn 3 you can cast Queen on turn 6 or 7. She really will win you games you have no business winning otherwise.
Ive noticed people mentioning having issues with Wingmate Roc. Hornet Queen is a great a answer to this. I have been saying and saying how this deck needs Hornet Queen. She is the best big finisher available- she is hard to deal with efficiently if at all, she is great at taking out planeswalkers, she can play partial offense while still playing defense, and completely halt the opponent's offense. She is also just about the only good way to deal with an opposing Prognostic Sphinx. People think the mana cost is prohibitive, but if you can cast Courser on turn 3 you can cast Queen on turn 6 or 7. She really will win you games you have no business winning otherwise.
I can get behind this statement. Hornet Queen (almost just typed "Horney Queen", lol) is a pretty good card for our deck in a variety of situations. I wouldn't jam her, and I wouldn't run more than like 1-2 in the sideboard, but she is a great answer to some of those late-game threats mentioned here.
She is great in the mb- even vs decks that you don't so much need the blockers she is 6 power in the air that is hard to deal with outside of a few answers that happen to line up poorly vs the rest of the deck. Say game 1 they see Kiora, Prognostic Sphinx, and Hornet Queen- it is going to make sideboarding very difficult for them as our threats would require very different and specific answers- also making them all the more vulnerable to Thoughtseize. The steep mana cost isn't an issue like it is out of more midrange decks since we are control and are going to take the game long regardless (plus caryatid helps too). There's really no reason not to mb her. What wouldn't you want Queen against? Very few decks.
Here is my deck running Hornet Queen. The Queen is a straight up all star- the single most dominating card in the deck hands down.
I could definitely see dropping a MB Silence or something to make room for another Sultai Charm if Jeskai Ascendency is big in your meta.
She is great in the mb- even vs decks that you don't so much need the blockers she is 6 power in the air that is hard to deal with outside of a few answers that happen to line up poorly vs the rest of the deck. Say game 1 they see Kiora, Prognostic Sphinx, and Hornet Queen- it is going to make sideboarding very difficult for them as our threats would require very different and specific answers- also making them all the more vulnerable to Thoughtseize. The steep mana cost isn't an issue like it is out of more midrange decks since we are control and are going to take the game long regardless (plus caryatid helps too). There's really no reason not to mb her. What wouldn't you want Queen against? Very few decks.
Here is my deck running Hornet Queen. The Queen is a straight up all star- the single most dominating card in the deck hands down.
I could definitely see dropping a MB Silence or something to make room for another Sultai Charm if Jeskai Ascendency is big in your meta.
Sorry for the double post, but here's my most recent list. I haven't been playing Sultai for a while now (I was on Temur for a minute there), so I would love to hear what folks think about this configuration:
here's my most recent list. I haven't been playing Sultai for a while now (I was on Temur for a minute there), so I would love to hear what folks think about this configuration
I liked most of what I saw in your list, except for the large number of Planeswalkers. I tried them all and wasn't impressed. Kiora was way too easily dealt wirh. Her low starting Loyalty and the proliferation of flying threats made it difficult to keep her alive. Nissa was a fast an efficient finisher, but she didn't help to stabilize the game and by the time she gets good a Sphinx usually would have finished the game also. Ashiok was great against midrange but Sultai was already great against midrange even without him. Also sometimes he just did nothing.
My list has been mostly unchanged. I played it in a couple of tournaments and did pretty well. The latest one was a 3-round FNM of roughly 20 people in Machida (near Yokohama). I beat Abzan Midrange, then Abzan Aggro, then Mardu Midrange. This continues the same pattern of Sultai being a heavy favorite against midrange strategies. The only games I lost were lost due to mana issues. Aggro strategies were slightly bad game 1 and got significantly better post-board. I also played against UB Control in a tournament and lost to it pretty badly. The match-up is certainly winnable but it's not good by any stretch of the imagination. Here is the latest incarnation of my list:
MD:
4 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Courser of Kruphix
4 Reaper of the Wilds
4 Prognostic Sphinx
4 Thoughtseize
4 Bile Blight
4 Hero's Downfall
2 Dissolve
3 Dig Through Time
1 Bow of Nylea
4 Opulent Palace
4 Temple of Malady
3 Temple of Mystery
3 Temple of Deceit
2 Llanowar Wastes
2 Yavimaya Coast
3 Forest
2 Swamp
1 Urborg
SB:
4 Drown in Sorrow
3 Nylea's Disciple
3 Negate
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Silence the Believers
2 Unravel the AEther
1 Bow of Nylea
The list has 58 cards with a 17-card sideboard. The idea is to bring in two SB cards based on the predicted metagame. My meta has tons of midrange so I normally start with two Silence the Believers.
here's my most recent list. I haven't been playing Sultai for a while now (I was on Temur for a minute there), so I would love to hear what folks think about this configuration
I liked most of what I saw in your list, except for the large number of Planeswalkers. I tried them all and wasn't impressed. Kiora was way too easily dealt wirh. Her low starting Loyalty and the proliferation of flying threats made it difficult to keep her alive. Nissa was a fast an efficient finisher, but she didn't help to stabilize the game and by the time she gets good a Sphinx usually would have finished the game also. Ashiok was great against midrange but Sultai was already great against midrange even without him. Also sometimes he just did nothing.
My list has been mostly unchanged. I played it in a couple of tournaments and did pretty well. The latest one was a 3-round FNM of roughly 20 people in Machida (near Yokohama). I beat Abzan Midrange, then Abzan Aggro, then Mardu Midrange. This continues the same pattern of Sultai being a heavy favorite against midrange strategies. The only games I lost were lost due to mana issues. Aggro strategies were slightly bad game 1 and got significantly better post-board. I also played against UB Control in a tournament and lost to it pretty badly. The match-up is certainly winnable but it's not good by any stretch of the imagination. Here is the latest incarnation of my list:
MD:
4 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Courser of Kruphix
4 Reaper of the Wilds
4 Prognostic Sphinx
4 Thoughtseize
4 Bile Blight
4 Hero's Downfall
2 Dissolve
3 Dig Through Time
1 Bow of Nylea
4 Opulent Palace
4 Temple of Malady
3 Temple of Mystery
3 Temple of Deceit
2 Llanowar Wastes
2 Yavimaya Coast
3 Forest
2 Swamp
1 Urborg
SB:
4 Drown in Sorrow
3 Nylea's Disciple
3 Negate
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Silence the Believers
2 Unravel the AEther
1 Bow of Nylea
The list has 58 cards with a 17-card sideboard. The idea is to bring in two SB cards based on the predicted metagame. My meta has tons of midrange so I normally start with two Silence the Believers.
Ah, thank you for the feedback.
One difference between this season and last is that you can't rely on your PW's to stabilize the game for you. I'm not 100% sure I want any at all. But left unchecked, any of them will win the game!
Abzan is one of our better matchups because our late-game answers are cheaper than their late-game threats. Our starting strategies are nearly the same (T1 Tapland; T2 Land, Caryatid, maybe Thoughtseize, T3 something else). Which means the threats they play are inefficient in light of our cheapr removal.
If it were your deck, would you cut all of the PW's?
Sorry for the double post, but here's my most recent list. I haven't been playing Sultai for a while now (I was on Temur for a minute there), so I would love to hear what folks think about this configuration:
Looking forward to any and all feedback. Thanks in advance!
i wonder, is the main purpose of ashiok to force weird attacks? i know that against midrange decks (with a bit of luck)it is great.
SB plan against aggro ? have you tested it against U/W heroic o you don´t see that deck too much ?
Sorry for the double post, but here's my most recent list. I haven't been playing Sultai for a while now (I was on Temur for a minute there), so I would love to hear what folks think about this configuration:
Looking forward to any and all feedback. Thanks in advance!
i wonder, is the main purpose of ashiok to force weird attacks? i know that against midrange decks (with a bit of luck)it is great.
SB plan against aggro ? have you tested it against U/W heroic o you don´t see that deck too much ?
Ashiok is multi-purposed, I would say. He forces them to make weird attacks, yes. He also recruits threats directly from their deck. And if left unchecked, his ultimate is pretty back-breaking.
If they're killing your CMC-3 planeswalker they are allowing you latitude to develop your board further that you may not have had otherwise.
It is important to note that Ashiok on the play can't be killed by any combination of attackers in current Standard. They can get him to 2 or even 1, but not zero.
I haven't tested against UW Heroic, but if I do start seeing it (or other Heroic variants), I suspect I will probably bring Aetherspouts back up to 2-3 main with more in the board.
Tapped Out - the dissipate is supposed to be a dissolve that was a typo.
I'm noticing a few too many Temple of Deceit around. If you Re running Polluted Delta and some basics, you really need all your other lands to produce green for Courser (and hopefully Hornet Queen- as I believe there's no good reason not to run her- she just does everything you need. If you are running Garruk, Apex Predator you should definitely make the switch to Hotnet Queen- as she just does everything he does better while generally being much harder to deal with.)
But think about her vs Garruk.
Garruk plusses to take out Walkers. Queen is six flying power over multiple bodies so can easily take out any walker with one attack.
Garruk can minus to kill creatures- this does gain you life but also leaves him on low loyalty to be attacked and killed by any guys still on the board. Queen makes 5 deathtouch bodies halting their entire board from being able to get through:
Garruk makes 3/3 dt tokens over time. Queen immediately puts an entire team with evasion on the board that can kill in a few swings. Queen can also simultaneously play offense and defense by swinging for 4 and leaving 2 tokens or such behind to block which is generally plenty to half their entire team.
Queen does all these things at the same time while Garruk has to pick one mode per turn. Garruk can be attacked and killed or answered by a Downfall or similar answer which is already useful against other cards in your deck such as Kiora and Courser. Queen demands answers that are pretty useless against you otherwise such as Drown In Sorrow. Sure a straight Wrath kills Queen and also Sphinx- but would also take out their entire team so would be easy to play around if they ran it ( I.e. Only play Queen when their board is developed) plus wraths are again bad vs control in general.
If it were your deck, would you cut all of the PW's?
I would cut Kiora entirely unless I expected zero Jeskai aggro. It's too much of a risk that you'll play her, bubble something and then the other guy casts a Mantis and eats her. I might maybe leave Ashiok on the sideboard for midrange match-ups if I could afford the slots. I won't say that running a Nissa or two in place of some Prognostic Sphinx is wrong, but I personally don't like it. Nissa ends the game really fast, but I want stabilizers more than I want finishers.
i wonder, is the main purpose of ashiok to force weird attacks?
I wouldn't rely on this. A good player knows when to attack Ashiok and when to ignore him. In the early rounds though you can get free wins from inexperienced players who don't know how to make that distinction.
I'm noticing a few too many Temple of Deceit around. If you Re running Polluted Delta and some basics, you really need all your other lands to produce green for Courser (and hopefully Hornet Queen- as I believe there's no good reason not to run her- she just does everything you need.
I have been Advocating zero Polluted Deltas for a while now, actually. The deck wants GG, UU and BB. I feel that it needs real duals, not better Evolving Wilds. Another bonus is that when you scry dead cards away, they stay on the bottom of the deck. I also like Queen over Garruk, but I don't run either of them mostly because I wanted more early stabilizers over late-game finishers.
Garruk plusses to take out Walkers. Queen is six flying power over multiple bodies so can easily take out any walker with one attack.
Garruk can minus to kill creatures- this does gain you life but also leaves him on low loyalty to be attacked and killed by any guys still on the board. Queen makes 5 deathtouch bodies halting their entire board from being able to get through:
Garruk makes 3/3 dt tokens over time. Queen immediately puts an entire team with evasion on the board that can kill in a few swings. Queen can also simultaneously play offense and defense by swinging for 4 and leaving 2 tokens or such behind to block which is generally plenty to half their entire team.
Queen does all these things at the same time while Garruk has to pick one mode per turn. Garruk can be attacked and killed or answered by a Downfall or similar answer which is already useful against other cards in your deck such as Kiora and Courser. Queen demands answers that are pretty useless against you otherwise such as Drown In Sorrow. Sure a straight Wrath kills Queen and also Sphinx- but would also take out their entire team so would be easy to play around if they ran it ( I.e. Only play Queen when their board is developed) plus wraths are again bad vs control in general.
I´m gonna step in here...
The biggest downside of queen is that he is been heavily played right now. That leads to hate, hate leads to lose games. Every deck with green, red, or black, can deal with her after the tokens easily. But again it´s a meta decision.
If you are jamming your deck full of Delve spells, The fetchlands are pseudo ramp for these spells. Mana is also far better than you are giving it credit for and the necessity for UU in the early turns is almost non existent outside of people wanting to play Dissolve on turn 3 - which is a horrible play when you have far more disposable answer cards, especially if you are on the Draw-Go board plan.
What I find interesting about this thread are the backdated arguments people try to use that are just no longer relevant. UUGGBB was far more relevant when the format was full of potential 2 for 1 advantages your opponent could play against you and you needed to be able to swiss army knife your 3 drops accordingly. I had originally been pushing for Dissolve in the board so sidestep mana demands while filling the deck with other options to do this and was criticized heavily for it. Now days this is pretty normal.
If you are boarding into the counter suite, you are more than equipped to not only relived yourself of having to have counter magic that demands UU, but you should also be relieving yourself of the need for GG by removing Courser of Kruphix. This kind of optimizing lets you prioritize your mana much more effectively switching your plan from being GGBB focused to being UUBB focused. The mana is incredible for supporting 2 color approaches right now and this model is incredibly effective and criminally underutilized and misunderstood. I touched on this carousel concept when I was writing about WBR Midrange during Return to Ravnica and it can also be translated to mana focus and deck configuration for 3 color bases.
I have a GPT and an IQ coming up this weekend and this is going to be the deck of choice for me, Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver, Prognostic Sphinx, Dig Through Time, and AEtherspouts are incredibly well positioned cards right now. Especially spouts, and to top it all off you are getting a SB plan that is incredibly hard for decks to simply try to work around because of how the deck transforms.
I'm not really sure if this is the right thread for this, but it is technically Sultai Control. Except instead of running walkers, my deck feels like U/B control that is splashing green for hexproof beaters and my favorite new charm. The main reason I'm brewing this up is because last weekend I drew in my first two rounds of an IQ. I was playing Adrian's list and both times I won a long game one, then lost game two rather quickly, which left us with less than ten minutes to play our final game. I'm not sure if it was just bad luck or if i was doing something wrong that I wasn't aware of. Well enough of my rambling, here is my current list:
What I noticed about playing around with this deck is that it has a better Jeskai matchup in my opinion. And after sideboard it gets way better. I like how my threats get on line faster than Pearl Lake Ancient. I also want to find room for a main deck Bow of Nylea, but can't really decide what to cut for it.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Standard: UB Control
Modern: UWR Control
EDH: Ezuri, Renegade Leader
Titania, Protector of Argoth
Phelddagrif
Glissa, the Traitor
Rosheen Meanderer
Yeah I am playing that UBg control similar to yours the green beaters are so much better than the blue or black ones. I am concerned about your mana base yours looks horrorfying I mean I like versatility of sultai charm but the pressure on my mana base was too high.. In a perfect world I'd use opulent palace over the ETB gain 1 life lands but I NEED the life gain I keep winning games on 1 or 2 life regularly. palace gives me the perfect 19 black 18 blue 8 green for probable turn 2 BB turn 3 UU and turn 6 G but with just 6 green sources this should work.
Again I am also inspired by Adrains list. I tried Flochs but the vault is just so good at mopping up problems. I have 1 font because of just not having the 4th dig but it seems fine and when using counterspells I just can't bring myself to use Divination I will always use Font over it.
Contumaz - the thig about there being hate for Queen is that any hate for her is going to be useless against the rest of the deck- which when you consider that we also run Thoughtseize - is just a losing proposition for the deck running hate.
Ukyo_rulz - zero Polluted Delta is definitely wrong. First off - it fuels delve and is synergistic in a big way with Courser. Secondly, you can't just jam your deck full of CIPT lands and call it a day. You need to be able to cast your spells on time of you're just going to fall behind.
You make it out to be like the mana is too shaky with it- but we have Opulent Palace and Sylvan Caryatid.
Turn 1 Palace into turn 2 any green dual (which should be all of them) into turn 3 Polluted Delta gives you access to double cc of all your colors.
Turn 1 any dual into turn 2 any other dual and caryatid gives you double cc in all your colors before turn 3.
Any setup with Palace and Caryatid gives you double cc in all your colors.
Turn 1 any dual into turn 2 basic + Caryatid into turn 3 another basic even gives you double of all your colors as long as the dual has the color not provided by your basics.
The list of possible starts that give you all your colors goes on and on. You have 8 cards that provide all 3 colors with plenty supplemental duals- and you usually don't even need UU early.
With a well constructed mana base including 4 Delta (and no other duals that don't produce green) it really is much harder to not hit all your colors. The mana is very smooth.
The much bigger issue is not being able to hit your removal on time vs an aggressive deck. Add in all the deck specific benefits of a fetch land- and it's really silly not to run them.
Narvuntien- even if burn decks were half the meta- good mana is still insurmountably better than 1 point of life. The gain lands see no competitive outside of the occasional 2 color deck for a reason. You might not get so low on life if you just had better mana to begin with.
Sagu Mauler isn't resilient enough to stand alone as a threat. He's fine vs some decks but he still bites it to Elspeth, Hornet Queen, and large blockers which are all prevelant.
0 Polluted Delta is definitely wrong. Too many CIPT lands early kills control decks, it throws you on the back foot trying to answer resolved threats rather then being proactive with your board.
Delta's also fuels delve which is great for speeding up Murderous Cut and/or Dig Through Time.
Part of me believes this will be a solid archetype once the next set it released. The deck desperately wants a wrath effect which it appears we will be getting in the form of Crux of Fate. Hold on tight fellow Sultai fans. We just need to be patient.
I don't have to and often don't want to cast Sagu mauler turn 6...I would not want more CIPT lands than I already have. My "perfect" mana base has the same number of tapped lands but has two extra scry lands instead of life lands. UB runs radiant fountains I think the life really does matter. Courser versions don't have to worry so much about things like fetch land burn. I could see an arugement for the cutting of the llanowar wastes because of the life lose but I want untapped black turn 2 often enough.
hornet queen and Elpeth never resolve. I have controlled more hornet queens than my opponents and I can drown it in sorrow if I need to. (It is really just whip and gensis hydra I have to worry about). Also hornet queen stops all the other win con options as well so that point is moot.
My other threat is Ashiok... either mill or my opponents creatures anyone with large enough blockers for sagu mauler almost always a great match up for Ashiok.
The only deck I have had trouble with keeping mauler on the table is Mardu control but they also cannot resolve thier win conditions so I just mill them to death. The slightly more aggro version/mid range/tokens gets confusing as you aren't really sure if they are aggro or control which can be tricky when sideboarding.
Thanks for the update .
Modern: MONKEY GROW & Amulet Titan
Legacy: RG Lands
EDH: Merieke Ri Berit Esper Good stuff
I looked at your manabase before reading your report and I was like "I be this guy is done with colorless lands after tonight..."
LOL
Here is my deck running Hornet Queen. The Queen is a straight up all star- the single most dominating card in the deck hands down.
I could definitely see dropping a MB Silence or something to make room for another Sultai Charm if Jeskai Ascendency is big in your meta.
4 courser of kruphix
3 prognostic sphinx
2 hornet queen
2 Kiora, the crashing wave
4 thoughtseize
3 bile blight
2 disdainful stroke
4 hero's downfall
2 sultai charm
1 dissolve
2 silence the believers
3 dig through time
3 temple of malady
2 temple of mystery
4 llanowar wastes
1 yavimaya coast
4 polluted delta
2 swamp
2 island
2 forests
4 drown in sorrow
1 bow of nylea
2 disdainful stroke
2 negate
2 reaper of the wilds
3 nylea's disciple
1 bile blight
Garruk filled that slot greatly. Three games it appeared just in time.
i guess that luck was on my side every other time. Now i need to take the deck to the next level and make it more consistent.
4 Courser of Kruphix
2 Prognostic Sphinx
4 Sylvan Caryatid
Planeswalkers (6):
3 Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
2 Kiora, the Crashing Wave
1 Nissa, Worldwaker
Instants & Sorceries (19):
1 Aetherspouts
3 Bile Blight
2 Dig Through Time
4 Hero's Downfall
1 Silence the Believers
4 Sultai Charm
4 Thoughtseize
3 Forest
2 Island
3 Swamp
4 Opulent Palace
4 Polluted Delta
4 Temple of Malady
4 Temple of Mystery
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
2 Bow of Nylea
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Dissolve
4 Drown in Sorrow
1 Negate
3 Nylea's Disciple
1 Phenax, God of Deception
Looking forward to any and all feedback. Thanks in advance!
I liked most of what I saw in your list, except for the large number of Planeswalkers. I tried them all and wasn't impressed. Kiora was way too easily dealt wirh. Her low starting Loyalty and the proliferation of flying threats made it difficult to keep her alive. Nissa was a fast an efficient finisher, but she didn't help to stabilize the game and by the time she gets good a Sphinx usually would have finished the game also. Ashiok was great against midrange but Sultai was already great against midrange even without him. Also sometimes he just did nothing.
My list has been mostly unchanged. I played it in a couple of tournaments and did pretty well. The latest one was a 3-round FNM of roughly 20 people in Machida (near Yokohama). I beat Abzan Midrange, then Abzan Aggro, then Mardu Midrange. This continues the same pattern of Sultai being a heavy favorite against midrange strategies. The only games I lost were lost due to mana issues. Aggro strategies were slightly bad game 1 and got significantly better post-board. I also played against UB Control in a tournament and lost to it pretty badly. The match-up is certainly winnable but it's not good by any stretch of the imagination. Here is the latest incarnation of my list:
MD:
4 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Courser of Kruphix
4 Reaper of the Wilds
4 Prognostic Sphinx
4 Thoughtseize
4 Bile Blight
4 Hero's Downfall
2 Dissolve
3 Dig Through Time
1 Bow of Nylea
4 Opulent Palace
4 Temple of Malady
3 Temple of Mystery
3 Temple of Deceit
2 Llanowar Wastes
2 Yavimaya Coast
3 Forest
2 Swamp
1 Urborg
SB:
4 Drown in Sorrow
3 Nylea's Disciple
3 Negate
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Silence the Believers
2 Unravel the AEther
1 Bow of Nylea
The list has 58 cards with a 17-card sideboard. The idea is to bring in two SB cards based on the predicted metagame. My meta has tons of midrange so I normally start with two Silence the Believers.
One difference between this season and last is that you can't rely on your PW's to stabilize the game for you. I'm not 100% sure I want any at all. But left unchecked, any of them will win the game!
Abzan is one of our better matchups because our late-game answers are cheaper than their late-game threats. Our starting strategies are nearly the same (T1 Tapland; T2 Land, Caryatid, maybe Thoughtseize, T3 something else). Which means the threats they play are inefficient in light of our cheapr removal.
If it were your deck, would you cut all of the PW's?
i wonder, is the main purpose of ashiok to force weird attacks? i know that against midrange decks (with a bit of luck)it is great.
SB plan against aggro ? have you tested it against U/W heroic o you don´t see that deck too much ?
If they're killing your CMC-3 planeswalker they are allowing you latitude to develop your board further that you may not have had otherwise.
It is important to note that Ashiok on the play can't be killed by any combination of attackers in current Standard. They can get him to 2 or even 1, but not zero.
Sideboard plan against aggro is—
- 4 Thoughtseize
- 3 Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
+ 4 Drown in Sorrow
+ 3 Nylea's Disciple
I haven't tested against UW Heroic, but if I do start seeing it (or other Heroic variants), I suspect I will probably bring Aetherspouts back up to 2-3 main with more in the board.
I'm noticing a few too many Temple of Deceit around. If you Re running Polluted Delta and some basics, you really need all your other lands to produce green for Courser (and hopefully Hornet Queen- as I believe there's no good reason not to run her- she just does everything you need. If you are running Garruk, Apex Predator you should definitely make the switch to Hotnet Queen- as she just does everything he does better while generally being much harder to deal with.)
But think about her vs Garruk.
Garruk plusses to take out Walkers. Queen is six flying power over multiple bodies so can easily take out any walker with one attack.
Garruk can minus to kill creatures- this does gain you life but also leaves him on low loyalty to be attacked and killed by any guys still on the board. Queen makes 5 deathtouch bodies halting their entire board from being able to get through:
Garruk makes 3/3 dt tokens over time. Queen immediately puts an entire team with evasion on the board that can kill in a few swings. Queen can also simultaneously play offense and defense by swinging for 4 and leaving 2 tokens or such behind to block which is generally plenty to half their entire team.
Queen does all these things at the same time while Garruk has to pick one mode per turn. Garruk can be attacked and killed or answered by a Downfall or similar answer which is already useful against other cards in your deck such as Kiora and Courser. Queen demands answers that are pretty useless against you otherwise such as Drown In Sorrow. Sure a straight Wrath kills Queen and also Sphinx- but would also take out their entire team so would be easy to play around if they ran it ( I.e. Only play Queen when their board is developed) plus wraths are again bad vs control in general.
I would cut Kiora entirely unless I expected zero Jeskai aggro. It's too much of a risk that you'll play her, bubble something and then the other guy casts a Mantis and eats her. I might maybe leave Ashiok on the sideboard for midrange match-ups if I could afford the slots. I won't say that running a Nissa or two in place of some Prognostic Sphinx is wrong, but I personally don't like it. Nissa ends the game really fast, but I want stabilizers more than I want finishers.
I wouldn't rely on this. A good player knows when to attack Ashiok and when to ignore him. In the early rounds though you can get free wins from inexperienced players who don't know how to make that distinction.
I have been Advocating zero Polluted Deltas for a while now, actually. The deck wants GG, UU and BB. I feel that it needs real duals, not better Evolving Wilds. Another bonus is that when you scry dead cards away, they stay on the bottom of the deck. I also like Queen over Garruk, but I don't run either of them mostly because I wanted more early stabilizers over late-game finishers.
I´m gonna step in here...
The biggest downside of queen is that he is been heavily played right now. That leads to hate, hate leads to lose games. Every deck with green, red, or black, can deal with her after the tokens easily. But again it´s a meta decision.
@tappedout
I will try your list. It looks intereting.
What I find interesting about this thread are the backdated arguments people try to use that are just no longer relevant. UUGGBB was far more relevant when the format was full of potential 2 for 1 advantages your opponent could play against you and you needed to be able to swiss army knife your 3 drops accordingly. I had originally been pushing for Dissolve in the board so sidestep mana demands while filling the deck with other options to do this and was criticized heavily for it. Now days this is pretty normal.
If you are boarding into the counter suite, you are more than equipped to not only relived yourself of having to have counter magic that demands UU, but you should also be relieving yourself of the need for GG by removing Courser of Kruphix. This kind of optimizing lets you prioritize your mana much more effectively switching your plan from being GGBB focused to being UUBB focused. The mana is incredible for supporting 2 color approaches right now and this model is incredibly effective and criminally underutilized and misunderstood. I touched on this carousel concept when I was writing about WBR Midrange during Return to Ravnica and it can also be translated to mana focus and deck configuration for 3 color bases.
I have a GPT and an IQ coming up this weekend and this is going to be the deck of choice for me, Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver, Prognostic Sphinx, Dig Through Time, and AEtherspouts are incredibly well positioned cards right now. Especially spouts, and to top it all off you are getting a SB plan that is incredibly hard for decks to simply try to work around because of how the deck transforms.
2x Prognostic Sphinx
2x Sagu Mauler
1x Reaper of the Wilds
Spells (29)
2x Perilous Vault
1x Aetherspouts
4x Dissolve
2x Disdainful Stroke
4x Hero's Downfall
4x Bile Blight
1x Silence the Believers
4x Dig Through Time
1x Jace's Ingenuity
2x Divination
2x Despise
2x Sultai Charm
4x Opulent Palace
4x Polluted Delta
4x Temple of Deceit
2x Temple of Mystery
1x Evolving Wilds
1x Dismal Backwaters
2x Yavimaya Coast
1x Llanowar Wastes
1x Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3x Swamp
3x Island
1x Bow of Nylea
3x Jorubai Murk Lurker
1x Pearl Lake Ancient
4x Negate
1x Silence the Believers
3x Drown in Sorrow
2x Thoughtseize
What I noticed about playing around with this deck is that it has a better Jeskai matchup in my opinion. And after sideboard it gets way better. I like how my threats get on line faster than Pearl Lake Ancient. I also want to find room for a main deck Bow of Nylea, but can't really decide what to cut for it.
Modern: UWR Control
EDH: Ezuri, Renegade Leader
Titania, Protector of Argoth
Phelddagrif
Glissa, the Traitor
Rosheen Meanderer
RIP Jimmy foREVer
Again I am also inspired by Adrains list. I tried Flochs but the vault is just so good at mopping up problems. I have 1 font because of just not having the 4th dig but it seems fine and when using counterspells I just can't bring myself to use Divination I will always use Font over it.
2 sagu mauler
Planewalkers
4 Ashiok, nightmare weaver
enchantments
1 font of fortunes
Artifacts
2 perilous vault
sorceries
3 Despise
2 Drown in sorrow
instants
4 Dissolve
4 Hero's downfall
3 Disdainful stroke
4 Bile blight
2 Silence the believers
3 Dig through time
4 temple of deciet
4 polluted delta
2 dismal backwater
2 thornwood falls
2 jungle hollow
2 llanowar wastes
4 island
4 swamp
1 urborg tomb of yawgmoth
3 Jorblani murklurker
2 Drown in sorrow
4 Negate
2 Pharaka's cure
1 disdainful stroke
1 pearl lake ancient
2 Thoughtseize
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
Modern: UWR Control
EDH: Ezuri, Renegade Leader
Titania, Protector of Argoth
Phelddagrif
Glissa, the Traitor
Rosheen Meanderer
RIP Jimmy foREVer
Ukyo_rulz - zero Polluted Delta is definitely wrong. First off - it fuels delve and is synergistic in a big way with Courser. Secondly, you can't just jam your deck full of CIPT lands and call it a day. You need to be able to cast your spells on time of you're just going to fall behind.
You make it out to be like the mana is too shaky with it- but we have Opulent Palace and Sylvan Caryatid.
Turn 1 Palace into turn 2 any green dual (which should be all of them) into turn 3 Polluted Delta gives you access to double cc of all your colors.
Turn 1 any dual into turn 2 any other dual and caryatid gives you double cc in all your colors before turn 3.
Any setup with Palace and Caryatid gives you double cc in all your colors.
Turn 1 any dual into turn 2 basic + Caryatid into turn 3 another basic even gives you double of all your colors as long as the dual has the color not provided by your basics.
The list of possible starts that give you all your colors goes on and on. You have 8 cards that provide all 3 colors with plenty supplemental duals- and you usually don't even need UU early.
With a well constructed mana base including 4 Delta (and no other duals that don't produce green) it really is much harder to not hit all your colors. The mana is very smooth.
The much bigger issue is not being able to hit your removal on time vs an aggressive deck. Add in all the deck specific benefits of a fetch land- and it's really silly not to run them.
Narvuntien- even if burn decks were half the meta- good mana is still insurmountably better than 1 point of life. The gain lands see no competitive outside of the occasional 2 color deck for a reason. You might not get so low on life if you just had better mana to begin with.
Sagu Mauler isn't resilient enough to stand alone as a threat. He's fine vs some decks but he still bites it to Elspeth, Hornet Queen, and large blockers which are all prevelant.
Delta's also fuels delve which is great for speeding up Murderous Cut and/or Dig Through Time.
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/developing-competitive-modern/598381-kiki-chord-kiki-company
Bring to Niv
https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/deck-creation-modern/814060-bring-to-niv-the-golden-deck
Legacy - Lands
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/legacy-type-1-5/established-legacy/control/535484-primer-lands
hornet queen and Elpeth never resolve. I have controlled more hornet queens than my opponents and I can drown it in sorrow if I need to. (It is really just whip and gensis hydra I have to worry about). Also hornet queen stops all the other win con options as well so that point is moot.
My other threat is Ashiok... either mill or my opponents creatures anyone with large enough blockers for sagu mauler almost always a great match up for Ashiok.
The only deck I have had trouble with keeping mauler on the table is Mardu control but they also cannot resolve thier win conditions so I just mill them to death. The slightly more aggro version/mid range/tokens gets confusing as you aren't really sure if they are aggro or control which can be tricky when sideboarding.
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