While we are loosing Gather the Pack and Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Scrapheap Scrounger is a significant upgrade that makes Prized Amalgam recursion much easier as well as making Delirium easier and allowing us to play Emrakul, the Promised End and relying less on discarding cards to Haunted Dead. Our mana also becomes much less painful. The deck has been very good so far and there was one copy in a feature match at SCG Indy early on.
Noose Constrictor This is a great discard outlet that also plays very well on both offense and defense and lines up perfectly vs Smuggler's Copter and enables our most explosive draws.
Scrapheap Scrounger This is the new addition and it adds a lot to the deck. It's an aggressive 2 drop that excels at bringing back Prized Amalgam without having to discard cards. On top of all of that, it is an artifact which makes Delirium very easy and allows Emrakul to be an option.
Prized Amalgam This is the primary Engine of the deck. Our best hands let us put multiples into play on 3rd or 4th turn. It's a nicely sized body that plays well on offense and defense and keeps coming back until they exile it.
Haunted Dead Another discard outlet and a 2nd enabler for Prized Amalgam. The Spirit is also great on defense buying time to move to our very strong end game.
Verdurous Gearhulk This is another nice tutor target and helps finish the game or helps on defense if we aren't able to clear the board with Kozilek's Return. This competes with Decimator of Provinces, but while it doesn't supply as much power or trample, it is far easier to cast and is better on defense. When we also now have access to Emrakul, the Promised End this wins vs Decimator.
Elder Deep-Fiend An enormously powerful tempo play that can wipe the opponent's board when combined with Kozilek's Return and time walk them by tapping their lands on their turn. Doing that after they've crewed vehicles or activated manlands is an even bigger blowout and the fact that it leaves a 5/6 is just icing on the cake.
Emrakul, the Promised End You can't go bigger than this and it will often leave the opponent with an empty board, hand, and staring down lethal. Our deck does a great job of filling the graveyard and finding this when we need it and is capable of casting this turn 6 which is quite absurd.
Vessel of Nascency Great at milling and finding what we need be it lands, creatures, Liliana, or even a 2nd copy to dig deeper. You usually want one in your opener.
Traverse the Ulvenwald Such a powerful card that fixes our mana early and goes for whatever we need later, this is extremely powerful and lets us find our silver bullet 1 ofs and can often help with our most explosive 3rd and 4th turn plays by tutoring up Amalgams to return. Delirium can be active in this deck as early as turn 3.
Grapple with the Past Yet another card that mills and helps you fix your mana. This is better late when your yard has more options, but is still perfectly acceptable turn 2.
Liliana, The Last Hope She is at her best here as this deck is capable of protecting her and her -2 is very strong in this deck. There are also currently a lot of X/1s around making her +1 very relevant.
Kozilek's Return Our best card vs Creature decks, it does require correct timing vs opposing Verdurous Gearhulk. I have done it and can tell you that triggering this in response to the green monster's trigger is like nothing else. Even after their board is very big, these work great in multiples and are simply amazing when combined with Elder Deep-Fiend.
Zach's Grixis diverges from the traditional lists by cutting green and making red a primary color instead of a splash in favor of Insolent Neonate and Cathartic Reunion. He also included 4 Smuggler's Copter.
While it is early in the format, we now have an idea what we will be facing and how to combat it. Of note, you don't want to sideboard too much as our deck is a machine of many parts. If you take too much out, it will stop functioning.
To the Slaughter and Ruinous Path are there to take care of planeswalkers. The first requires delirium and gives them a choice if there are multiple planeswalkers, but takes out a creature too while the other just kills what it targets.
Noxious Gearhulk Is a good value card and great to tutor up to kill Kalitas which can be a problem card for our deck. Still, 6 mana is a lot and the only other thing we cast that costs that much is Emrakul, which does a lot more than just kill Kalitas.
Distended Mindbender is a 1 of that can help vs control or combo decks you might come across.
Think it usually takes a week before they put videos of the feature matches up. Right now there's a variant that took 2nd at the Open playing red instead of green. Not sure how the Sultai lists ended up.
The meta was all aggro so I think adding the mountain to the main over the 2nd Sunken Hallow is probably correct in order to hard cast K Return game 1.
He did very well, but I seriously question Perpetual Timepiece. All of the discard/draw spells help shape your hand very well and red gives very good removal out of the board, but Noose Constrictor is very well positioned and Traverse the Ulvenwald is seriously OP while also making a slight red splash much easier.
That Grixis list makes me realize my brainstorming the past two weeks to put together was going in the right direction. He definitely shouldn't have main decked perpetual timepiece over Key to the City, and the lack of removal other than Koz Returns bothers me a bit. Idk why he would do this unless he wasn't expecting as much aggro as there was.
Private Mod Note
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By: ol MISAKA lo
Cockatrice: Infallible
Mhjames: mtgsalvation: I DON'T SEE HOW THIS CARD IS GOOD. I KNOW PATRICK CHAPIN USED IT AND WENT 8-0, BUT THAT WAS A SMALL TOURNAMENT. THE CARD IS TOO SLOW. YOU NEED TO MAKE SURE THE OPPONENT HAS A SPELL IN THE GRAVEYARD
Timepiece is an enabler; Key to the City, while a far better card, isn't. I'm rather surprised that the deck could function so well without the green enablers. He has a ton of looting effects, so maybe I just underestimated how easily he could cycle through his deck. I'm looking forward to testing it this week.
Based on the success of this deck at SCG Open Indianapolis, this thread is moving to Established. Stewardship of MTGSalvation members interested in variants of this deck lies with you. Please let me know if this is a problem. -- hoser2
Hey guys, a lot of the top decks seem to rely on the grave yard a lot . what all options are there for gy hate. Doesn't really seem like there is much.
Been wanting to play this since last rotation as I thought this wouldn't take too much of a hit without Jace. This is probably what I'll test with. Not sure if scrapheap scrounger fits in this shell like the r/b decks.
Scrapheap essentially makes Amalgam recursion a lot more consistent. Hands where you return 2 amalgams on 3rd turn are a lot more common than they used to be. Last Friday, I had 3 amalgams in play 3rd turn and all 4 on 4th turn during two of my 13 games. Smuggler's Copter is actually much slower than Noose constrictor for this although it's power level clearly warrants testing. If we're adding those, Scrapheap and Noose Constrictor are the best ways to make it active on curve so the cuts have to come from somewhere else. Grapple with the Past has been one of the less impressive cards in the deck for me so shaving a couple of those is the first place I'd like to start. After that, things get murkier. Possibly moving Ishkana to the board and trimming another Haunted Dead. Also, Decimator of Provinces may be harder to cast, but it has also been more powerful than Verdurous Gearhulk in my testing so the pig gets the nod over the green machine for now.
Three matches isn't a large sample size, but Copter felt abysmal in the first and only ok in the 2nd two. It would take a lot more reworking to make it good in my build. It just always felt clunky and Grapple with the Past would have been a better play every time.
Pieces of the Puzzle is very, very bad in this deck. Altar's Reap is cute, and you might be able to +1 off of it by using it in resp to a removal spell, but it's a very dead draw and doesn't do anything Tormenting Voice wouldn't already do for you, with the upside of Voice being a graveyard enabler (while still being a terrible top deck. also red.)
Not playing Traverse if you're in sultai is a mistake. That is one of the best cards in standard, let alone the deck. Cut the puzzles and at least one of the reap's and add a set of those, but optimally i'd cut the puzzles, all but one of the reap's and add 4 Traverse and 2 Key to the City
Private Mod Note
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By: ol MISAKA lo
Cockatrice: Infallible
Mhjames: mtgsalvation: I DON'T SEE HOW THIS CARD IS GOOD. I KNOW PATRICK CHAPIN USED IT AND WENT 8-0, BUT THAT WAS A SMALL TOURNAMENT. THE CARD IS TOO SLOW. YOU NEED TO MAKE SURE THE OPPONENT HAS A SPELL IN THE GRAVEYARD
Pieces was intended to be a replacement for Gather the Pack, which I use some in my Delirium deck. The +1 mana cost is relevant, but I hadn't done any testing with it yet. Why is it very, very bad for the deck? It's a graveyard enabler and allows me to hit other graveyard enablers. It's definitely not the ideal T3 play, but if I hit a few key cards in the yard, it can set up T4 really nicely.
Altar's Reap is cute, and you might be able to +1 off of it by using it in resp to a removal spell, but it's a very dead draw and doesn't do anything Tormenting Voice wouldn't already do for you, with the upside of Voice being a graveyard enabler (while still being a terrible top deck. also red.)
Reap is another card that needs some testing, but I think it will be much more relevant than Voice. Instant speed, on color (notice I have one mountain as my lone red source...), and can generate lots of tricks. Take for example, if I have Amalgam in the yard and either Scrounger or Dead in play, I can sac and return on their 2nd main phase, allowing Amalgam to come back and netting me +1 cards in hand (the reverse scenario is also true, with Amalgam in play and Dead or Scrounger in yard). As you noted, it can effectively blank a removal spell, which can be handy if the spell is exiling. Voice does none of these, although Voice does allow me to discard a relevant card. I might play Voice over Reap if I were Grixis, but I don't want to add a 4th color strain to the mana base.
Not playing Traverse if you're in sultai is a mistake. That is one of the best cards in standard, let alone the deck. Cut the puzzles and at least one of the reap's and add a set of those, but optimally i'd cut the puzzles, all but one of the reap's and add 4 Traverse and 2 Key to the City
Traverse is only really good if I can achieve delirium. This isn't a delirium deck. I have 5 card types in the deck, and one of those (Scrapheap) won't want to stay in the yard. Adding Keys gets me back to 5 cards types, but still not a super high probability of hitting delirium early. Traverse is good for land fixing, so I may add 2-3 to the deck if I cut Puzzles, but I'm not adding a playset unless I find that I can reliably get delirium by T5/T6.
What are everyone's thoughts on Harsh Scrutiny? T1 play that allows you to remove a relevant creature threat from opponent's hand and scry. Not the worst T1 play in the world.
It would be much better for a control deck. Unless it hits Kalitas before he lands, it's not really helping our game plan in any way. A removal spell would be better.
I'm mostly talking about the grixis list that did well, it uses looting effects and graveyard synergy, im a little concerned with kalitias against it because he stops all ground attacks and literally deals with them for a while, and there is no removal in the deck other then return, maybe smugglers copter is how he got around kalitias, I don't know, I played a u/b version of this deck at gp portland and did fine with it, but I packed 4 grasp 3 salvations 2 paths and 2 elder deep fiends. And still had a prob with the card in some matches.
While the deck does reasonably well, I definitely didn't have enough ways to get stuff in the yard and is therefore relatively slow/clunky. I feel like the deck needs a few more graveyard enablers, but without sacrificing the power of the deck. I was wont to add Copter, but it may need to go in the deck as a means of filtering. I originally had Pieces of the Puzzle, which is probably just ok, but I'm now considering Contingency Plan since it's one mana cheaper and gives me the option of GY or top of the library. Fortune's Favor or Epiphany at the Drownyard may be other interesting cards for the deck, but they're probably too slow. From there, I'm looking at Vessel of Nascency, Minister of Inquiries, or other less effective ways of getting cards to yard. Any ideas?
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While we are loosing Gather the Pack and Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, Scrapheap Scrounger is a significant upgrade that makes Prized Amalgam recursion much easier as well as making Delirium easier and allowing us to play Emrakul, the Promised End and relying less on discarding cards to Haunted Dead. Our mana also becomes much less painful. The deck has been very good so far and there was one copy in a feature match at SCG Indy early on.
Scrapheap Scrounger This is the new addition and it adds a lot to the deck. It's an aggressive 2 drop that excels at bringing back Prized Amalgam without having to discard cards. On top of all of that, it is an artifact which makes Delirium very easy and allows Emrakul to be an option.
Prized Amalgam This is the primary Engine of the deck. Our best hands let us put multiples into play on 3rd or 4th turn. It's a nicely sized body that plays well on offense and defense and keeps coming back until they exile it.
Haunted Dead Another discard outlet and a 2nd enabler for Prized Amalgam. The Spirit is also great on defense buying time to move to our very strong end game.
Ishkanah, Grafwidow Great at stabilizing the board, especially vs fliers.
Verdurous Gearhulk This is another nice tutor target and helps finish the game or helps on defense if we aren't able to clear the board with Kozilek's Return. This competes with Decimator of Provinces, but while it doesn't supply as much power or trample, it is far easier to cast and is better on defense. When we also now have access to Emrakul, the Promised End this wins vs Decimator.
Elder Deep-Fiend An enormously powerful tempo play that can wipe the opponent's board when combined with Kozilek's Return and time walk them by tapping their lands on their turn. Doing that after they've crewed vehicles or activated manlands is an even bigger blowout and the fact that it leaves a 5/6 is just icing on the cake.
Emrakul, the Promised End You can't go bigger than this and it will often leave the opponent with an empty board, hand, and staring down lethal. Our deck does a great job of filling the graveyard and finding this when we need it and is capable of casting this turn 6 which is quite absurd.
Traverse the Ulvenwald Such a powerful card that fixes our mana early and goes for whatever we need later, this is extremely powerful and lets us find our silver bullet 1 ofs and can often help with our most explosive 3rd and 4th turn plays by tutoring up Amalgams to return. Delirium can be active in this deck as early as turn 3.
Grapple with the Past Yet another card that mills and helps you fix your mana. This is better late when your yard has more options, but is still perfectly acceptable turn 2.
Liliana, The Last Hope She is at her best here as this deck is capable of protecting her and her -2 is very strong in this deck. There are also currently a lot of X/1s around making her +1 very relevant.
Kozilek's Return Our best card vs Creature decks, it does require correct timing vs opposing Verdurous Gearhulk. I have done it and can tell you that triggering this in response to the green monster's trigger is like nothing else. Even after their board is very big, these work great in multiples and are simply amazing when combined with Elder Deep-Fiend.
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Grapple with the Past
4 Kozilek's Return
2 Liliana, The Last Hope
4 Noose Constrictor
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Prized Amalgam
3 Haunted Dead
1 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
1 Verdurous Gearhulk
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
1 Emrakul, The Promised End
4 Botanical Sanctum
4 Blooming Marsh
3 Forest
2 Island
2 Swamp
1 Mountain
1 Sunken Hollow
1 Dispel
2 Negate
3 Lightning Axe
3 To the Slaughter
2 Lost Legacy
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
2 Wretched Gryff
1 Distended Mindbender
4 Haunted Dead
4 Noose Constrictor
4 Prized Amalgam
1 Wharf Infiltrator
1 Wretched Gryff
1 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
3 Forest
2 Island
1 Mountain
2 Swamp
1 Aether Hub
4 Blooming Marsh
4 Botanical Sanctum
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Lumbering Falls
1 Sanctum of Ugin
1 Sunken Hollow
4 Grapple with the Past
4 Kozilek's Return
1 Collective Brutality
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
1 Distended Mindbender
3 Gnarlwood Dryad
1 Pulse of Murasa
1 Summary Dismissal
1 Emrakul, the Promised End
1 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
2 Lost Legacy
2 Ruinous Path
2 Transgress the Mind
Zach's Grixis diverges from the traditional lists by cutting green and making red a primary color instead of a splash in favor of Insolent Neonate and Cathartic Reunion. He also included 4 Smuggler's Copter.
2 Cryptbreaker
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
4 Haunted Dead
4 Insolent Neonate
4 Prized Amalgam
2 Wretched Gryff
2 Island
3 Mountain
1 Swamp
4 Evolving Wilds
3 Sanctum of Ugin
4 Smoldering Marsh
3 Spirebluff Canal
3 Sunken Hollow
4 Smuggler's Copter
3 Kozilek's Return
4 Cathartic Reunion
3 Invasive Surgery
1 Kozilek's Return
2 Lightning Axe
2 Summary Dismissal
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
3 Collective Brutality
Vs Aggro Lightning Axe and Wretched Gryff come in for the slower cards 2 Liliana, the last Hope, Verdurous Gearhulk, and Emrakul, the Promised End as well as 1 Scrapheap Scrounger which can't block. Wretched Gryff triggers Kozilek's Return easily, matches up very well with Smuggler's Copter, and all while drawing an extra card. Lightning Axe is a very potent removal spell that helps enable our plan. Kalitas is also an option here.
Dispel is mainly for Summary Dismissal while Negate can help there as well as cover other bases.
Transgress the Mind This is good in the mirror and against control decks.
To the Slaughter and Ruinous Path are there to take care of planeswalkers. The first requires delirium and gives them a choice if there are multiple planeswalkers, but takes out a creature too while the other just kills what it targets.
Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet and Lost Legacy come in for other Prized Amalgam decks.
Noxious Gearhulk Is a good value card and great to tutor up to kill Kalitas which can be a problem card for our deck. Still, 6 mana is a lot and the only other thing we cast that costs that much is Emrakul, which does a lot more than just kill Kalitas.
Distended Mindbender is a 1 of that can help vs control or combo decks you might come across.
Modern: UW Spirits
Dredge (117-70 W/L in games) (Pre-GGT ban: 103-70 W/L in games)
Modern: UW Spirits
Modern: UW Spirits
Ziang Chen
55th Place at StarCityGames.com Standard Open on 10/1/2016
Standard
4 Haunted Dead
4 Noose Constrictor
4 Prized Amalgam
1 Wharf Infiltrator
1 Wretched Gryff
1 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
3 Forest
2 Island
1 Mountain
2 Swamp
1 Aether Hub
4 Blooming Marsh
4 Botanical Sanctum
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Lumbering Falls
1 Sanctum of Ugin
1 Sunken Hollow
4 Grapple with the Past
4 Kozilek's Return
1 Collective Brutality
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
1 Distended Mindbender
3 Gnarlwood Dryad
1 Pulse of Murasa
1 Summary Dismissal
1 Emrakul, the Promised End
1 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
2 Lost Legacy
2 Ruinous Path
2 Transgress the Mind
I believe he was 5-0 and in a feature match at one point, but obviously he dropped off later on.
Grixis Emerge
Zach Voss
2nd Place at StarCityGames.com Standard Open on 10/1/2016
Standard
2 Cryptbreaker
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
4 Haunted Dead
4 Insolent Neonate
4 Prized Amalgam
2 Wretched Gryff
2 Island
3 Mountain
1 Swamp
4 Evolving Wilds
3 Sanctum of Ugin
4 Smoldering Marsh
3 Spirebluff Canal
3 Sunken Hollow
4 Smuggler's Copter
3 Kozilek's Return
4 Cathartic Reunion
3 Invasive Surgery
1 Kozilek's Return
2 Lightning Axe
2 Summary Dismissal
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
3 Collective Brutality
He did very well, but I seriously question Perpetual Timepiece. All of the discard/draw spells help shape your hand very well and red gives very good removal out of the board, but Noose Constrictor is very well positioned and Traverse the Ulvenwald is seriously OP while also making a slight red splash much easier.
Modern: UW Spirits
By: ol MISAKA lo
Cockatrice: Infallible
UR Blue-Red Control
Modern:
UBR Grixis Control
UWR Jeskai Control
RNA Standard: Grixis Midrange, Jund Deathwhirler, Sultai Vannifar
GRN Standard: Red Midrange, Mono-Blue Tempo, Wr Aggro, Gruul Experimental Dinosaurs, Sultai Midrange, Jeskai Midrange
Modern: Bant Spirits
Forcing a single archetype in all formats: too many colors, bad mana.
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Haunted Dead
4 Prized Amalgam
3 Noose Constrictor
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
2 Cryptbreaker
1 Wretched Gryff
Instant (7)
4x Grapple with the Past
3x Kozilek's Return
Sorcery (5)
4x Traverse the Ulvenwald
1x Dark Salvation
Artifact (2)
2x Smuggler's Copter
Land (24)
4x Aether Hub
3x Blooming Marsh
2x Botanical Sanctum
4x Evolving Wilds
1x Forest
2x Island
2x Sanctum of Ugin
4x Sunken Hollow
2x Swamp
1x Invasive Surgery
2x Negate
2x Natural State
1x Emrakul, the Promised End
2x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
2x Collective Brutality
2x Lost Legacy
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
Decks:
2 Cryptbreaker
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Prized Amalgam
4 Haunted Dead
2 Wretched Gryff
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
2 Cathartic Reunion
3 Key to the City
4 Smuggler's Copter
3 Kozilek's Return
3 Smoldering Marsh
3 Sunken Hollow
3 Spirebluff Canal
2 Foreboding Ruins
3 Sanctum of Ugin
3 Mountain
2 Island
1 Swamp
2 Ceremonious Rejection
1 Negate
2 Summary Dismissal
3 Collective Brutality
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Distended Mindbender
2 Lightning Axe
1 Kozilek's Return
4 Noose Constrictor
4 Prized Amalgam
4 Haunted Dead
4 Elder-Deep fiend
3 Srapheap Scrounger
1 Ishkana, Grafwidow
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
(16) Spells
4 Grapple with the Past
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Kozilek'ss Return
4 Vessel of Nascency
2 Liliana, the Last Hope
(21) Lands
4 Blooming Marsh
4 Botanical Garden
3 Forest
2 Island
2 Swamp
1 Mountain
1 Aether Hub
2 Sunken Hollow
1 Lumbering Falls
1 Evolving Wilds
1 Summary Dismissal
1 Negate
1 Emrakul, The Promised End
1 Ishkana, Grafwidow
2 Lost Legacy
2 Natural State
2 To the Slaughter
2 Transgress the Mind
3 Gnarlwood Dryad
Any further testing or is Grixis deemed better?
4 Traverse the Ulvenwald
2 Grapple with the Past
4 Smuggler's Copter
4 Kozilek's Return
2 Liliana, The Last Hope
4 Noose Constrictor
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Prized Amalgam
2 Haunted Dead
1 Decimator of the Provinces
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
1 Emrakul, The Promised End
4 Botanical Sanctum
4 Blooming Marsh
3 Forest
2 Island
2 Swamp
1 Mountain
1 Sunken Hollow
1 Dispel
2 Negate
2 Lightning Axe
3 To the Slaughter
2 Lost Legacy
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1 Ishkana, Grafwidow
2 Wretched Gryff
1 Distended Mindbender
Modern: UW Spirits
I think you want 1-2 more Hunted Dead because it triggers Prized Amalgam and provides a 1/1 for Smuggler's Copter.
Decks:
Modern: UW Spirits
Modern: UW Spirits
2 Cryptbreaker
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Noose Constrictor
4 Prized Amalgam
2 Wretched Gryff
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
3 Haunted Dead
4 Grapple with the Past
4 Kozilek's Return
3 Altar's Reap
24 Lands TBD
Not playing Traverse if you're in sultai is a mistake. That is one of the best cards in standard, let alone the deck. Cut the puzzles and at least one of the reap's and add a set of those, but optimally i'd cut the puzzles, all but one of the reap's and add 4 Traverse and 2 Key to the City
By: ol MISAKA lo
Cockatrice: Infallible
Pieces was intended to be a replacement for Gather the Pack, which I use some in my Delirium deck. The +1 mana cost is relevant, but I hadn't done any testing with it yet. Why is it very, very bad for the deck? It's a graveyard enabler and allows me to hit other graveyard enablers. It's definitely not the ideal T3 play, but if I hit a few key cards in the yard, it can set up T4 really nicely.
Reap is another card that needs some testing, but I think it will be much more relevant than Voice. Instant speed, on color (notice I have one mountain as my lone red source...), and can generate lots of tricks. Take for example, if I have Amalgam in the yard and either Scrounger or Dead in play, I can sac and return on their 2nd main phase, allowing Amalgam to come back and netting me +1 cards in hand (the reverse scenario is also true, with Amalgam in play and Dead or Scrounger in yard). As you noted, it can effectively blank a removal spell, which can be handy if the spell is exiling. Voice does none of these, although Voice does allow me to discard a relevant card. I might play Voice over Reap if I were Grixis, but I don't want to add a 4th color strain to the mana base.
Traverse is only really good if I can achieve delirium. This isn't a delirium deck. I have 5 card types in the deck, and one of those (Scrapheap) won't want to stay in the yard. Adding Keys gets me back to 5 cards types, but still not a super high probability of hitting delirium early. Traverse is good for land fixing, so I may add 2-3 to the deck if I cut Puzzles, but I'm not adding a playset unless I find that I can reliably get delirium by T5/T6.
Modern: UW Spirits
Decks:
2 Cryptbreaker
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Noose Constrictor
4 Prized Amalgam
2 Wretched Gryff
4 Elder Deep-Fiend
3 Haunted Dead
3 Traverse the Ulvenwald
4 Grapple with the Past
4 Kozilek's Return
2 Altar's Reap
1 Key to the City
Lands:
4 Sunken Hollow
2 Blooming Marsh
2 Botanical Sanctum
2 Lumbering Falls
2 Choked Estuary
4 Evolving Wilds
4 Swamp
2 Island
1 Forest
1 Mountain
While the deck does reasonably well, I definitely didn't have enough ways to get stuff in the yard and is therefore relatively slow/clunky. I feel like the deck needs a few more graveyard enablers, but without sacrificing the power of the deck. I was wont to add Copter, but it may need to go in the deck as a means of filtering. I originally had Pieces of the Puzzle, which is probably just ok, but I'm now considering Contingency Plan since it's one mana cheaper and gives me the option of GY or top of the library. Fortune's Favor or Epiphany at the Drownyard may be other interesting cards for the deck, but they're probably too slow. From there, I'm looking at Vessel of Nascency, Minister of Inquiries, or other less effective ways of getting cards to yard. Any ideas?