Well your mileage certainly may vary, but the way I see it your 4-color build is still just trying to do too much while sacrificing a lot of the consistency that makes Monsters good. Your blue splash isn't just as simple as having X number of sources per card you want to play off color, as running stuff like Temple of Deceit, Watery Grave, and Temple of Malice is limiting your ability to produce green (and specifically double green or early green for Course or Caryatid). Caryatid might help you fix the colors, but only if you can play it on time. Both Notion Thief and Izzet Charm are essentially double off-color spells that really require perfect timing to be effective, and they don't lend well to the Tap-Out strategy that is at the core of a monsters deck. Rift might be super strong when you overload it, but I don't see how it's that great as a simple 2-mana bounce spell, especially when Doom Blade or Dreadbore would have removed the threat permanently instead. Overloading Rift is not exactly going to come up that frequently, and it's not that much better than just overloading a Mizzium Mortars, so I still don't see the value. But if you wanted to splash for Rift and maybe a couple other SINGLE splash blue cards, you could probably do so better without running lands like Watery Grave, which are just useless in the early turns and WILL Make you mulligan more than is necessary or acceptable.
I get your reasons for wanting the 4th color, but you haven't convinced me it's worth it. You may not perceive the consistency loss as being an issue, but I guarantee it would be very noticeable at a large event with 8+ rounds. If you really want to run powerful spells in all the colors, I'd just take after Zvi and go all-in, rather than clinging too tightly to a tried-and-true shell like G/R.
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MODERN RGB Jund BGR WGB Junk/Abzan Company WGB
LEGACY RUGB Delver GURB
EDH UW Geist of Saint Traft Aggro-Control WU RUG Riku of Two Reflections Combo GUR BBB Skithiryx Control BB
Well your mileage certainly may vary, but the way I see it your 4-color build is still just trying to do too much while sacrificing a lot of the consistency that makes Monsters good. Your blue splash isn't just as simple as having X number of sources per card you want to play off color, as running stuff like Temple of Deceit, Watery Grave, and Temple of Malice is limiting your ability to produce green (and specifically double green or early green for Course or Caryatid). Caryatid might help you fix the colors, but only if you can play it on time. Both Notion Thief and Izzet Charm are essentially double off-color spells that really require perfect timing to be effective, and they don't lend well to the Tap-Out strategy that is at the core of a monsters deck. Rift might be super strong when you overload it, but I don't see how it's that great as a simple 2-mana bounce spell, especially when Doom Blade or Dreadbore would have removed the threat permanently instead. Overloading Rift is not exactly going to come up that frequently, and it's not that much better than just overloading a Mizzium Mortars, so I still don't see the value. But if you wanted to splash for Rift and maybe a couple other SINGLE splash blue cards, you could probably do so better without running lands like Watery Grave, which are just useless in the early turns and WILL Make you mulligan more than is necessary or acceptable.
I get your reasons for wanting the 4th color, but you haven't convinced me it's worth it. You may not perceive the consistency loss as being an issue, but I guarantee it would be very noticeable at a large event with 8+ rounds. If you really want to run powerful spells in all the colors, I'd just take after Zvi and go all-in, rather than clinging too tightly to a tried-and-true shell like G/R.
Sure. However, I do want to point out I overload Rift most of the time I play it. The times I don't it is really the instant speed/hit anything that is more relevant but I mean I play 2 in the list. I see it like once in 4 games or something and overload 3/4 times. It is considerably better than overloading Mortars against other decks that play big creatures.. Mostly green decks. Sometimes you just need that window. It's fine I'm catering to a very specific line. I can see how you might say it's like playing DoJ in a white weenie deck that has a mechanism to make it's creatures indestructible for a turn. Basically there are situations you aren't supposed to be able to dig yourself out of in certain decks. I just find the curve inconsistency of the current green decks being such a pain having some use for the game going longer and flooding a bit is good. Something like Mutavault is a bit under our average quality of card to really take advantage of.
It's possible I have too many black sources. I mean I don't think CVM's list supports those sideboard Thoughtseizes well. The reason I have Watery Grave is that I was playing heavier black recently and moved back from it. However, I don't think more than 13 red is really necessary either. If you made Watery Grave and Deceit Swamps, and traded all the other blue duals for their basic counterparts that's basically what I was playing before. The blue literally cost me nothing compared to the mana setup I was playing previously. I mean we played Falkenrath last season with 13 red and like 10 black as a 4 of. If you want to talk about a card that needs to be played on time that's a great example. Both Izzet Charm and Notion Thief do need to be played on time, just not T2 and T4 respectively. Both are behind the curve answers which tend to get played later. For a tap out deck yes that doesn't make a ton of sense unless you in some matchups play the tempo or control role. Those are no harder for me to cast than CVM casting Dreadbore. Having some room to play around against more aggressive decks can open up different lines and give the deck more depth. I mean Golgari Charm against control is an example of playing the Tempo role. In those matchups we generally play a threat every turn until we can't and they proceed to deal with them. However, if we ever establish enough board and have enough mana we tend to hold Golgari Charm up. Mind as I said Notion Thief is an experiment. Izzet Charm has been good for me, Thief I played once and lost as drawing 3 cards didn't do enough. Mind you I probably misplayed an earlier Thoughtseize, taking Elspeth instead of their 2nd Rev. To me though Notion Thief has the potential to be sort of Restoration Angel like in that matchup. I didn't particularly like Resto against Control compared to say Hero of Bladehold at the time simply since Hero was so deal with me or die and Resto mostly promoted value only on the board (pre Thragtusk ridiculousness) but I'm really just theorizing.
I think the blue is addable on top of the 16 green, 13 red, 11 black mana base pretty easily if desired. Even with the same number of Scrylands. Ie the consistency loss is 4 extra life payed in many games. How often does that life matter? As I said I have to adjust my mana base just a slightly. I just deliberately lowered my green count to 14 to raise my black count and I think I went too far. I know from experience and past formats 14 green is sufficient for the whole deck minus Courser. It's enough to say mulligan any hand without a green source (I can provide multi Standard tournament winning lists over the past 8 years that support that claim). The thing is I don't think Monsters is consistent. That is what annoys me about this deck. I have bit biased expectations as I generally play this sort of deck in every Standard format. The deck is so awkward curve wise yet Caryatid and Scrylands are so essential that to me the cost of colour ambition pales considerably to how awkward curve is. What we need are some more potent cards. Right now (and largely why the deck has started to drop off) is that we are just trying to jam cards that are pretty good but actually in the scheme of things aren't that great, but we play enough that hopefully we take initiative and sort of get there. Like do you side in/keep in Xenagos against mono black. The card is a planeswalker so it's value but it also dies to a single Lifebane swing. How about Polukranos? It's that sort of thing. This deck doesn't feel like it has a good gold fish. More that if you draw your cards in the right order and the opponent doesn't or sequences their removal awkward you got it. There is no, Avacyn Pilgrim, Blade Splicer, Resto Angel, Gavony Township or Pilgrim, Mirran Crusader, Hero of Bladehold, Gavony Township. There is no Gyre Sage, BTE, Falkenrath, Thundermaw Hellkite, Bonfire for x = 3. Noble Hierach, Lotus Cobra, Fetch into Sovereign of Lost Alara. For these decks to be viable there are usually some sort of nut draw. We Mystic.. Caryatid (maybe Courser, Domri).. Stormbreath or Polukranos.. I mean there is no redundancy on the 1 mana ramp. There is no kill you 4 drop. Our big 5 drop takes 5 turns to win on it's own. It needs some sort of help. I think it needs some bigger swingy effects in some matchups that are specifically good in those matchups. In BR we have big discard effects like Rakdos's Return and Sire of Insanity. But I think their application is limited since everyone is sort of playing this off the top of your deck format (and not in a miracles way). Nothing is splashy and everything incremental. You have plenty of time to find answers. No I win cards or way to complete take tempo advantage in one stroke.
Anyway I know the blue splash isn't really all that interesting to most people here. However, I think we all feel that missing element. We've tried a lot of different stuff (some people dabbling into devotion etc). I've spent hundreds of hours with Jund and a few dozen with straight GR in this Standard Format since BNG came out (I also played variants before BNG but that is less relevant). I'm still working at it. I've definitely played novelty ideas that have hurt me in longer tournaments so I definitely can use the advice to stay closer to the standard. I have enough just missed top 8's in the larger local tournaments/ptqs where basically crapping out a whole round to mulligans might have made the difference. Then again maybe I was unlucky there and lucky somewhere else (it's always memorable when you win with the novel tech, even if it's possibly incorrect). I think the blue splash is interesting and I think with a bit more work on the mana base and the sideboard it has some potential.
So, that was a lot of stuff about past standard formats and how G/R/x Monsters is not the same deck as previous powerhouse decks in the format, but it was a little off topic. My primary point was that Jund Monsters doesn't need the 4th color, and it only serves to exacerbate the issues the deck has with consistency and curving out well. I DO think that Blue is a reasonably good splash in G/R/x decks, but I don't think we need to push ourselves to a 4th color. RUG Monsters is a very interesting deck, and one I am keeping an eye on, but my stance is still that you have to choose one direction or the other. Playing BURG Monsters in Standard is just asking for trouble with consistency, and that was one of your major complaints about this archetype.
If you've played it for as long as you say, that obviously you have your reasons to stray from the "Norm", but I was mostly pointing out the issues I perceive with your 4-color mana base for the sake of the others on this thread. *crickets*
I think you could easily play a 4-color deck that resembles Jund Monsters, but with a more stable mana base and perhaps an even more powerful plan. But I really think you aren't gaining more than you are losing by trying to combine Discard with counterspells and instant speed effects in a 4-color deck that's essentially just Big Midrange Aggro at heart. While I see the appeal of some instant speed tricks like Charm and Rift, I really think the discard spells will do just as much in helping you win the game without twisting your mana to uncomfortable levels.
Losing 4 extra life per game to even more shocklands, and having to run even more (off-color) Temples is just super awkward when we already clearly have some issues curving out. Not to mention there are decks that will just kill you if you pay too much life for stuff like shocklands and Thoughtseize.
Trying to figure out how much the life mattered was part of the exercise. I think the answer is more than I thought but less than you'd expect. It wasn't against aggro that it was hurting me. Burn matchup was fine. Aggro in this format is slow as molasses comparatively. It was against like Mono Black or other random decks where I wasn't as concerned about my life early hut it would ultimately put me in range of some gotcha tactic like Gray Merchant a turn earlier than I should have. This didn't matter in most games but it mattered in the games where the play is to force a race. This is what ultimately has led me to back off on the blue.
The mana base was no worse than any green 3 colour base. As I pointed out I could basically mimic Kiblers colour requirements with equal number of scry lands and actually have more of each colour than CVM + have blue. Ie. 16G, 13R, 11B, 8U. Other than life mutavault was the cost and truthfully I find it not impressive in these lists at all. We play it to tray to get some more value out of our lands but it is often so little. Even now I think I'd rather play less scry lands to get my colours. It's definitely tricky since scrylands help you not flood but the early cost is so brutal. As I said this is why I wanted to try 4 colours. We are already paying the cost in scry lands and awkward curve. That is the cause of the consistency issues not colours. Adding the blue did not affect in anyway the playing of non-blue cards on time (outside of life concerns, which was a lot harder to gauge on cost then one might expect). Basically the biggest cost of the blue potentially was having a blue spell in hand and not being able to cast since there were only 9 sources + Caryatid. This pretty much never happened since there were rarely more than 2 blue cards in my deck in a given matchup, so getting jammed on blue was not an issue. By the time you need it, it's generally there. If there was good enough tools then it would be worth it, I think. Ultimately Rift was the only effect I couldn't get a close enough elsewhere. Izzet Charm was used more as shock than as Spell Pierce. It was better against burn than anywhere else. I only ever used the 3rd mode once to pull a Golgari Charm off the top my deck revealed by Courser agaist White Weenie. Notion Thief is too cute. You have to already be playing on that axis for it to matter.
The reason for the long rant about other formats is simply how I build. I care very little about the cards, but what I need the deck to do. Then I find the cards that fit that need. Obviously the need slightly moves Standard Format to Standard Format and what we can do changes too, but the same patterns emerge over and over. This GRx deck is lacking one piece significantly. The black splash is way more relevant than the blue. The RUG deck has more serious issues. Sometimes you have to go deep to find it. Not every format is very accomodating to these strategies. Pre-Huntmaster Delver Standard I was working on Naya and people had given on GW because of how awkward that matchup was with Gut Shot and Vapor Snag. I played Kemba Skyguard main deck and didn't lose to Delver all day at the CMT (Canadian Magic Tournament Series.. we don't get SCG up here). I came in 9th, mind you as I lost to Wolf Run Ramp in the last round (I would have drawn but my opponent wasn't sure if he would make it in). The point was I was basically looking for Huntmaster of the Fells before I knew it existed and went with what I could make work.
What Monsters need? Well the accelerator curve and scry lands prevents us from being legitimately aggressive enough across matchups. The main reason is individually our finishers suck. As big as our 4 drops are, we're basically playing vanilla creatures asking to be two for oned. Notice how all the 5 drops minus Arbor Colossus and Underworld Cerberus are 4/4 max. Those creatures play out so Vanilla you don't even want to play them in this high removal metagame. This is part of what makes RUG awkward. Insufficient power on curve. As good as Prophet is, it's a 5 mana 2/3. Simic creatures are small. So we desperately need something to funnel our mana into. Like some manlands. But Mutavault is so under our curve it's pretty difficult. So what do we do we use Discard when things go the other way. We try to keep them off their game, but it costs them no investment. This format is played largely off the top of the deck. Discard is too slow, unless you are curving out just right. Not that permission is really reasonable, as Supreme Verdict makes it just awkward enough (not to mention Simic's anemic creatures) that it's dragging into a game we can't win against larger decks. Thoughtseize is always going to be better against us than for us since we can't play enough removal backup since we invest so many cards in mana. We generally empty our hands with ramp, leaving the key targets left in the hand for the picking. Against other decks it's much more incremental. We need a way to leverage our board into a 'I Win' situation. People were playing Flesh/Blood for this but any thing that relies on targetting any one creature is dangerous. I understand why there is no Overrun in a format with mono green devotion, but we want Overrun, or at the very least an unmatchable equipment. This is what led me to looking at Chromanticore since as far as aura's go.. but 7 is too much for something that targets. We need this thing to be 5 maybe 6 tops if it is individually focused. Bestow is too expensive to not be fairly conditional. Overload is too by that measure but it is a one sided mass effect. I mean if you aren't super fast, how do anything as swinging to compete with Supreme Verdict or Sphinx's Rev, Elspeth, Master of Waves, Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Fanatic of Mogis. We have Rakdos' Return. Look how it lines up against those. Green has Garruk, I guess, but it still takes 2 turns to really turn it around. Talk about insult to injury, Stormbreath can't even one shot a freshly played Elspeth.. We can have a board and they can potentially tap out without much concern. They generally don't since they can wait and be safer but that's just how absurd the balance is. It's also intentional I'm sure from WotC design perspective. If there is a solution I'm convinced it will be a bit out of the box. I'm convinced Jund is the closest but how the fill the gaps is challenge I will continue to explore.
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Anyway This is what I'm currently trying. I still have the blue splash but I've lessened it and set myself up to play only 4 scrylands and 4 basics. 4 basics seems about right to avoid that critical life loss I was talking about. The mana is 15, 12, 12, 4. Mind you I only bring Rift in matchups that Caryatid doesn't die (ie Green, Mono Blue, Mono White etc.. so I think I can pretty solidly consider the blue at 8). Against Burn, and Control (but not usually mono black.. maybe..) I bring in Dreg Mangler. I like Dreg Mangler and Exava simply in that they dodge the black removal esper brings in to kill Mistcutter Hydra, and they are on curve where Hydra is a turn behind. I've found that Hydra doesn't do very much these days. Sure it's good against mono blue but I have so many sweeping effects there (Golgari Charm, Mortars, Rift) that I tend to not need that gimmick as much. Anyway basically the idea is in some matchups the full playset of Coursers are a liability and in other matchups you want to curve down a bit. I played Vraska in the past but I love Vraska much more now that I'm supplementing with other removal. Garruk I still find very key against Mono Black. That's definitely where it's at it's best. Although Game 1 against green decks Garruk is pretty good. Basically decent against most midrange strategies. I'm giving some stuff CVM suggested a try like main decking a Sire. It hasn't been great but it hasn't been bad either. It's given me weird avenues to outplay my opponent.
Online seems to be all Black and Esper right now I've been getting tons of practice I think the sideboard plan like this is working a lot better for me. I'm also 2-0 against burn so far.
But the mana is worse. While your "Color Count" might be similar to the successful 3-color versions, it's at the cost of Zero basics, 6 Temples, and 2 off-color shocks that don't cast turn 1 Mystic.
If splashing blue is primarily for Cyclonic Rift, I'm curious as to why only 2 copies total? We know Notion Thief isn't the best card for this deck, and I can't imagine Izzet Charm is better than something like Abrupt Decay or Dreadbore, so it really does seem like Cyclonic Rift is your primary pull to Blue. I get that it does things that no other card does, but I still doubt it is worth the consistency issues of the deck.
Part of the battle with Standard is picking out what you want to succeed against. I think it would be better to target a specific meta, and thus tune your maindeck and sideboard to beat those archetypes, than to be all over the place with colors in what is meant to be a very streamlined 2-color deck.
Again, not trying to dissuade you to try new things, or to run a 4-color deck with a variety of powerful spells, I'm just pointing out that it's a bit outside the realm of consistency for this archetype.
But the mana is worse. While your "Color Count" might be similar to the successful 3-color versions, it's at the cost of Zero basics, 6 Temples, and 2 off-color shocks that don't cast turn 1 Mystic.
If splashing blue is primarily for Cyclonic Rift, I'm curious as to why only 2 copies total? We know Notion Thief isn't the best card for this deck, and I can't imagine Izzet Charm is better than something like Abrupt Decay or Dreadbore, so it really does seem like Cyclonic Rift is your primary pull to Blue. I get that it does things that no other card does, but I still doubt it is worth the consistency issues of the deck.
Part of the battle with Standard is picking out what you want to succeed against. I think it would be better to target a specific meta, and thus tune your maindeck and sideboard to beat those archetypes, than to be all over the place with colors in what is meant to be a very streamlined 2-color deck.
Again, not trying to dissuade you to try new things, or to run a 4-color deck with a variety of powerful spells, I'm just pointing out that it's a bit outside the realm of consistency for this archetype.
It's worse because of the life.. But just using the example's given above.. like Kibler 6 temples.. 2 off colour lands that can't cast mystic (Mountain, Mutavault). The cost is the 6 shocks. The life loss is the only difference. You are just as likely to have all your colours on time. There is no consistency issue if you are willing to pay 2 life (unless theoretical you could get a hand jammed with blue cards). In terms of getting your Green, Red, and Black Sources, it's exactly the same. I was curious if the life mattered. Yes it does. Seems obvious, but it didn't matter where I expected or actually as much. If there weren't Gray Merchant in the format I think it would be feasible or say if Stormbreath was a 5/5. It's really that close I believe. But we need every small margin we can get.
Cyclonic Rift's draw is it saved me from playing a bunch of different sideboard card. It basically lets me run less Doom Blades, Ultimate Price, not have to go into Anger of the Gods, Bile Blight territory, or even Gaze of Granite, Gruul Charm, or Devour Flesh. Basically my problem when I was playing Jund Monsters was I couldn't beat GW, and I was having trouble with UW. I think I've figured out how to handle the control matchup better. But since that time GB Dredge, and some GU variants have appeared. I basically came on here and asked how do people beat GW. There was some talk of Lifebane, but without the rest of the black support shell I found it inadequate. I play mostly online so I guess I could just metagame for that, but I don't like having any really bad matchups if I can avoid it. I mean there is always Hexproof when you don't draw the hate cards. Basically my biggest issue is this deck is just awkward enough to lose to even worse decks that are more awkward but are also more ambitious. Decks that shouldn't be able to win very much but just have some gimmick. More often than not all of that category (including the mirror) lose to just some stupid big effect. It's the most frustrating scenario to play in since our big effects are not good enough. Losing to random bad decks shouldn't be something a tier one deck should have to worry about. A deck crafted in way that should hate on us like Mono Black or Blue sure or Hexproof which comes on a different angle efficiently... But some random Progenitor Mimic deck or some white weenie deck that hard casts Angel of Serenity sometimes. I mean that's I've actually tested a lot of these random ideas, and quickly recognized they weren't good enough, but they can be good enough to beat our collection of pretty decent cards.
It feels like Jund Monsters is positioned to beat Aggro, and have a decent Devotion matchup. It can be heavily boarded to beat control, but it's sort of bad against random strategy x. That always eventually catches up with popular decks. Having a 3rd Rift seems interesting option. Right now I have yet to draw Chandra or Izzet Charm since I went down to one. It's possible I should just consolidate some numbers.
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Ryansolid, please start another Variant thread. Your deck is not Jund Monsters. It is 4 Color Monsters, and while it is an interesting deck, posts about your 4 color mana base and your inclusions of Izzet Charm and Cyclonic Rift are not helpful to people trying to actually discuss the Jund build and its merits. I'm not trying to offend, but you taking this thread away from the purpose it was created for. Please create a thread for your build, and you can discuss it at length there.
Yeah no problem. Sorry about that, all. It wasn't my intention to derail the thread. I only posted my list as an after thought and the in depth discussion only followed when prompted. Although in hindsight it probably made sense to do so privately when it was clearly off topic. I did see some value initially in the motivations and observations relevant to Jund Monster's natural perceived short comings/gaps to fill, but it definitely got too down to specifics of the blue inclusion. Admittedly it was something I saw as a minor subtlety.. Like when Jund during Alara-Zen splashed for Spreading Seas for the mirror, but I can see how others could think otherwise. Sorry for getting carried away. I'm done on the subject.
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Anyone read the latest articles from CVM and Kibler on SCG?
Kibler seems to be going back and forth. He is on straight GR now. Ultimately it was the mana for him. He first started cutting down his black content so he can play less scry lands. I think this is potentially a good move. Going to 4 Scrylands at the cost of cutting down to 1 Mutavault at 24 lands to fill your colour for the sake of curving seems like a reasonable idea. Of course this means he's back on Ghor Clan over Reaper even in his Jund list which he says he abandoned. His concern seemed to be that his 1-3 Mystic Draws weren't consistent with only 10 black sources in the lands. Even if he drew the black source T3 only 8 would be playable. Under that logic I can see why 12 would actually be the minimum in land and where counting Caryatid doesn't apply. Our Mystic draws have the potential to be better than every deck in the format and he wanted to maximize for that. Mind you maybe he's just being a bit overzealous with his red sources. 15 seems like a lot. CVM only plays 13. So it could be addressable perhaps. He left it at this:
The Hammer he said is an experiment everything else looks standard. I guess he was looking for a cheaper version of Xenagod.. Xenagod really is in direct competition with the weapons. They both just sit there and have some general effect, but at 5 is a lot later. Mind you in Kibler's GR list he gushes about Xenagod.
CVM on the otherhand said he liked everything about his main deck from last week except the full set of Ghor Clan and he likes Kibler's Vraska inclusion. He goes in a bit into Courser but he still is on that less than 4 is correct. Otherwise he's pretty set on his list.. He's thinking Vraska for Garruk, and 1 Reaper for a Ghor Clan or possibly 2 Reaper for Ghor Clan and an Ooze. It's interesting because from the way he wants to cut it sounds like he feels he is still hitting a lot of air in his list which only has 23 lands. It might simply be due to the number of Xenagos which are difficult to leverage when you aren't ahead and his Ghor Clans feel more like 2 drops than valid 4's so he finds himself holding them and not wanting to cast them as much which sort makes the impact of certain cards reduce. It's just speculation but that's the impression I get from what he's describing.
Also interesting he's very high on Thoughtseize and is even considering cutting additional Hydra's for more copies. That's something I can relate to. He said he was boarding it in all the time. Mind you it's easy to see why you wouldn't want them main. I think it isn't because it isn't generally good but that it only works postboard when we can specialize. Almost like our main deck plan can't leverage Thoughtseize as well. I've found mind you overloading on Thoughtseize against control dangerous. I mean it can be really good, but we do still need to runner runner often enough that it's dangerous. I think the key is to not play the full 4.. 2 maybe 3, but maybe depending on your hand actually hold them til the turn before your opponent can make the big play.. Against a lot midrange decks that means before their T4.. If you can make Accel Dormi/Courser + Thoughtseize work you are in good shape usually. Against Control unless we are all in on dorks I actually think before their T5 is timing probably. Maybe T6.. Although against control I guess it's really a matter of fitting in where ever have room. Our mana forces Thoughtseize later anyway, so that compliments not going too crazy with it anyway.
It's interesting where their opinions meet and they seperate. Or where they were once in agreement and switched. Or where their positions have swapped with each other etc.. I think it says something interesting about the feel of this format.
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I have been losing miserably to BW Midrange. What are other people's sideboarding moves and general strategies against that deck?
I have been siding in Thoughtseize and Rakdos's Return and hoping to wipe out their hand before they wipe out mine and out card advantage them with Courser and planeswalkers.
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One of these day I have to get myself organizized.
I have been losing miserably to BW Midrange. What are other people's sideboarding moves and general strategies against that deck?
I have been siding in Thoughtseize and Rakdos's Return and hoping to wipe out their hand before they wipe out mine and out card advantage them with Courser and planeswalkers.
Really? I've found that to be one of the easier matchups. I don't think I've ever lost a round against it. Planeswalkers, Dreadbores, and Mizzium Mortars are pretty key. I also think Rakdos's Return is pretty solid, since making them play in topdeck mode is pretty awful for them. I also sideboard 2 Putrefy, which takes care of Obzedat.
I've also found most BW builds right now reasonable, in that most lists aren't gunning for us anymore. I mean yes still some main deck lifebane's but they are less likely to have the right removal game 1. This makes all the difference in the matchup since if game 1 is reasonable versus auto lose the postboard games are already generally considerably better for us it makes the matchup go from seeming sort of 50/50 ish to seeming quite favourable. I've been trouncing BW online quite a lot recently. I've found the past few days it's the deck I've faced the most.
So when it comes to boarding for the most part I bring in most planeswalkers and gold creatures and side out expensive mono color or green creatures on top of bringing in more removal. The tricky part is both Xenagos and Chandra can be very good in the matchup but also can do near nothing. You still want them but it is a consideration. Beyond that awkwardness Vraska is very good, and I've found Garruk really good if you have it. Side out Polukranos, Ghor Clan if you can afford too (it's alot easier in lists that play Reaper, since you want to keep Reaper in). I'd argue that even shaving Dragons down a couple is reasonable. They tend to bring in Doom Blade and Ultimate Price. Let them use them on the Coursers. Black Gold Cards can be very good here since most lists aren't brining in the Dark Betrayals. Attacking their hand is good, but more so when you are ahead. The non-creature hand attacks compete with pure spot removal slots. It really depends on how you gauge your opponent to how you want to balance that. Some players take a more aggressive threat stance against us, and some still try to play the card grind game.
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will try to provide more detail on match-ups when I get a chance - but here's a short version ...
won 50ish person SCG IQ yesterday - traveled to my brother's home store for FNM and IQ the next day
My brother and I talk it out, and I change a few cards from my original plan - no Reaper of the Wilds at all, but I'm going to try maindeck Sire of Insanity as a six-drop instead of running Rakdos's Return as planned. I also like that this frees up spell slots for extra planeswalkers. He also gets me to try a third Xenagos, the Reveler again in the deck (I had been running three way back when)to ramp harder and it's not terrible against any common deck. I also swap the Garruk, Caller of Beasts to the sideboard for the Vraska the Unseen that's been hanging out there as it makes me feel better about only having two Dreadbore. In short, we end up on a modified form of CVM's build...
you can watch me lose Round 1 of FNM against a version of Reid Duke's Junk Midrange on camera on ZachSellsMagic Twitch stream - it was an interesting match; I almost had game 1, won game 2, and game 3 was close as well
I do okay but nothing spectacular and put a little cash with a little store credit to finally get a fourth Stormbreath Dragon as planned; my brother was playing the same list within a few cards, so most importantly we have a lot of anecdotal data of how the deck might fare the next day.
We agree that Sire of Insanity is good but both like Rakdos's Return better - so I move two Return back into the main and a singleton Sire replaces the Return in the SB. I cut Xenagos, God of Revels as a pseudo-dragon and run a fourth copy of the real thing. I'm not sold on the third Xenagos, the Reveler but leave it as the +1 can lead to some pretty ridiculous turns 4-6 where you're playing either two threats or a big Rakdos's Return to protect the board you've developed. At the last minute, I also buy a Primeval Bounty and throw it in the sideboard for the Sire of Insanity since I'm boarding into Jund Control in a lot more match-ups than a month or two ago (sided it in a few times never drew it so not sure if I like it anymore than just in theory). I register this:
I start 3-0 (see ZachSellsMagic on Twitch another time to see my third round win - another interesting match but this time against BW midrange - EDIT: skip to around 2.5 hours into it), lose round 4 to the Rg devotion pilot who ended my FNM, and then get paired up against an undefeated opponent (there were only three at that point and the other two quickly announce intentional draw) round 5 and win which lets me draw round 6 with the undefeated player I hadn't played yet into the top 8. Quarterfinals of top 8 are a rematch from the pair-up who is a Rw devotion player - he gets stuck on two lands and then also has to mulligan multiple times game 2. Semifinals are rematch against the Rg pilot who has rolled me two matches in a row, and he has mulligan problems game 3. The aggressive devotion decks (I also played monoblue once) are much easier to stabilize against when they start with less than 7 cards in hand AND you run Rakdos's Return and Thoughtseize - imagine that... The finals would've been against a college student playing Gruul Monsters not interested in the invite or packs - he offers a split where all he takes is most of the money and runs; I accept. I didn't get to play him either at FNM or that day - but he said his list was pretty much template. In my experience, it can be a bit of a coin flip at times - Xenagos, God of Revels seems to be how straight Gruul beats me most of the time.
If I were to play again this weekend, I think I would change the Chandra, Pyromaster (move to sideboard) to a second Vraska the Unseen and possibly find a way to squeeze a singleton Putrefy (keeping two in the sideboard) into the main - possibly by cutting the third Xenagos, the Reveler yet again. Both of these Golgari cards were just that spectacular this weekend. I also think I liked the deck better with two Mountain; I will probably trim the fourth Temple of Abandon for it since I'm running 5 Forest and don't want to give up a black source. Perhaps this is the next iteration ...
If I weren't already so light on creatures, I could stomach trimming the fourth copy of Ghor-Clan Rampager to keep the third Xenagos, the Reveler. The ??? is a green six-drop either 1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts or 1 Primeval Bounty I suppose - Garruk has won me games before, but I at least want to get a Bounty in play a few times before I give up on my potential Stroke of Genius (sorry, couldn't resist). I guess I had better actually start getting some practice in with my Legacy deck too (a version of Loam Pox).
Thanks for the writeup Mootown. I like the latest iteration a lot. I think I would much rather splash black for removal rather than change the core of the deck. I like what you're doing and it seems to go well for you too. I tried straight RG this weekend at GP Phx and ended up 6-3, one short of the top 64. Oh well, I do think removal would have helped against desecration demon, and also that stupid golgari reanimation deck too.
Thanks for the writeup Mootown. I like the latest iteration a lot. I think I would much rather splash black for removal rather than change the core of the deck. I like what you're doing and it seems to go well for you too. I tried straight RG this weekend at GP Phx and ended up 6-3, one short of the top 64. Oh well, I do think removal would have helped against desecration demon, and also that stupid golgari reanimation deck too.
no problem - I started the thread with the intent of keeping it curated as long as the deck was relevant (did the same with Gruul Aggressive Midrange last Standard) - so it's nice to occasionally get a 'thanks' or a 'kudos' to be sure it's actually relevant to someone else (though I have found that basically blogging my tinkering with the decks has helped me understand and reflect on decision-making in terms of both deck-building/tinkering and gameplay) - too bad you couldn't win one more! if I were to go back to straight Gruul, I've been thinking a lot about Flesh//Blood and/or Pit Fight and/or Fall of the Hammer as pseudo-removal - were you running any of these?
as for my deck,
If I weren't already so light on creatures, I could stomach trimming the fourth copy of Ghor-Clan Rampager to keep the third Xenagos, the Reveler. The ??? is a green six-drop either 1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts or 1 Primeval Bounty I suppose - Garruk has won me games before, but I at least want to get a Bounty in play a few times
I wouldn't fault anyone for still liking Reaper of the Wilds enough to cut a Ghor-Clan Rampager (I was often siding a copy out) and a Polukranos, World Eater to the sideboard for the matches where it's really good - this also prevents me from trying to figure out which green grindy six-drop to run in the sideboard in the empty slot that I had said could be either Garruk, Caller of Beasts or Primeval Bounty. I might end up trying it this way next myself - possibly being able to block Lifebane Zombie isn't terrible.
@mootown: Your sideboard is dangerously entering no proactive threat zone. With already a low creature count it's even more of a real thing. I know most bodies are fairly unimpressive and you have the majority of the walkers you'd want main, but having a board of pretty much all removal limits the sort of options you can take when boarding. Like against Control you must be going down in threats (not just going down in creatures). If there are cards you actively do not want in matchups you have no choice but go down in threat density. Thoughtseize can round out a lot of that for sure but it can be awkward all the same. Not that I'm always the biggest fan of Sire, but I have imagine that is the biggest argument for it's inclusion. The addition of Vraska hasn't seemed to free up slots like I'd expect. Consider you went from 2 Dreadbores, and a Vraska.. and added 1 Putrefy main and another Vraska main yet only -1 Putrefy from the board. I'm not sure if you can afford to up the Thoughtseize count as well with that sort of configuration. (I'm actually not sure any of the lists can).
I think grindy 6 drop describes it well. The slot that is. The go bigger plan basically comes down to that and every good option is grindy. Sire hasn't impressed me terribly either but being a creature is worth a lot. I'm not really sure what is best in that slot. My hunch is Garruk, but that's harder to support if you already have a ton of walkers. Reaper is terribly outclassed as a 6 drop so to speak. It's best as a 4 that gives the opponent incentive to try to kill it immediately. As a 4 mana 4/5 with possible upside it's pretty good, as a 6 drop it is good when fighting out on the ground matters or you are ahead. It's sort of like the Ghor Clan dilema. Ghor Clan isn't a very good 4 comparatively in this format (most 3 drops have equal or better stats), but ability to push initiative of your attacks with it or the threat of it is considerably better. Reaper isn't the type of card to sandbag unless you have a threat to play every turn before it, and you know the opponents follow up play won't reverse board. Sometimes it's better to play Reaper first if you have them on Demon. Anyway as a '6' Reaper's a bit disappointing the way Ghor Clan is at '4'. You don't mind having the flexibility but you expect a lot more from the slot.
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I did have 2 flesh//blood in the side, but I think mortars was more relevant and less conditional removal, and I had plenty of reach already. something I did try that I liked was clan defiance in monsters side. it helps deal with elspeth quite nicely, and is very often a 2 for 1, and x = 4-5 usually.
There has been a bit of an exodus from Jund back to GR of late, for valid reasons to be sure, but I'm unsure of how actually warranted it is. GR still has huge issues with Elspeth and Desecration Demon the mascots for the 2 most popular decks right now. There is other awkwardness too like GR is going to be more susceptable to Lifebane Zombie regardless and worse against the near non-existent mono blue (who knows when that swings back around). Generally out of saving some life against Aggro I'm not convinced GR is better than Jund in any matchup.
Of course the argument right now has everything to do with mana. And the very first question I pose is, does Mutavault actually do very much at all in Monster's decks? Are we sure the 5th scryland is worth it? To me the cost of each additional scry land is the most painful part of the Jund list. If people just stopped auto opting to 4 Temple of Abandon, and actually looked at the counts to try to make something balance there is no reason with 24 lands one could not make a better manabase with only 4 scry lands... Secondly 15 red sources? + Caryatid.. I don't get it at all. Chandra, Pyromaster in my mind is the biggest argument for that and even that is fine with 14 unless you really just have T3 it without a Caryatid. If you are not playing Chandra it is a bit ridiculous. Dragon needs like 12.. Even counting Caryatid as half sources the way you'd count BoP you can probably play Dragon in a deck with 10 red land sources. That's the minimum I suppose, but playing more than 13 (what you need so that you can T2 Domri) is completely unwarranted. Especially if you are in the not 4 Domri boat which is a real consideration given the way some lists are being built.
16 G, 13 R, 11 B.. This is enough to play single black cost 4 drops. Honestly you could go down to 15 g, and up to 12 b without noticing very much and that would more than secure any single black spell you wanted to play (and possibly expensive double black spells). Why bother?
Because the deck needs to shore up 2 matchups primarily: Esper and Mono Black.
The way to do that is not lose what GR teaches us. You need very little to almost get there. And we have room since these matchups playing a bunch of Ghor Clans is a bit awkward anyway. GR isn't quite good enough but it doesn't mean turn your sideboard into all Ultimate Prices and Abrupt Decays.
Let's look at black first. The way to do this stop playing cards over 3cmc that get taken by Lifebane (that can't atleast interact profitably). The best way to do that, play impactful planeswalkers and Rakdos creatures. They can't all be planeswalkers because without the ability to defend they get weaker and Domri gets worse. The first go to is Sire of Insanity but it's a 6 drop, really we need to look along the 4-5 curve first to see if there are better options. There is Chandra and Xenagos, which have varying success here. Honestly this alone I think pushes people into playing Reaper. I know some people don't like it, and I don't think it's a great card but I have such a hard time picture not playing it given the metagame. I side it out often when it feels slow, but it is the best 4 drop in that role. Other cards I recommend people try are Exava. I know different deck etc, but First Strike 4/x is very nicely positioned, it gives you the timing to race Pack Rat and it kills chumping Grey Merchants. It doesn't get through Demon but you need other tools for most of the deck to get through Demon anyway. At 5 Vraska just seems a no brainer. Other interesting cards especially if you opt for 12 black is Herald of Torment.. At 5 mana 12 is sufficient for double black (keep in mind that is half your lands produce black). I'm not suggesting playing a bunch but flying over can make a big difference and it also lets you get a flier bigger than Demon if needed. Sire is good but black with Connections or Pack Rat can play off an empty hand pretty well. I actually think Garruk Caller of the Beasts is just the most powerful effect against that deck. Where Sire punishes control more Garruk is so brutal for decks trying to one for one. I've won games almost single handedly off Garruk where they've burned through all their removal and go for the Demon, I play Garruk with just a dork in play and manage to just draw out of it since the demons could never attack with endless stream of cheap mana dorks to sac.
Against Control you need similar but slightly different tact. I mean Thoughtseize is good but they are less likely to face off with you on the board so early aggression pays off more. Courser of Kruphix and most of our mana dorks are a bit of a liability in terms of just being cards that get swept up without being capable of delivering much damage. Not that we can get rid of all the dorks for curve concerns. The problem is with boarding in so many expensive spells a lot of lists have a hard time cutting any number of dorks. Again having a couple choice on curve replacements makes a lot more sense. You see GR talk about Mistcutter but Mistcutter can't attack through Elspeth Tokens anyway and even though it can't be countered there are plenty of answers, and until x=4 it's pretty small. It's the haste that matters. Against Exava is very good here, as a board option as it has a better rate on curve. It's worse against Blood Baron. Vraska, great again, Sire or Garruk also very good. But the problem is not having a swap for Courser and Scavenging Ooze. Say Ooze becomes some number of Golgari Charm, you still need a hard hitting 3 even more so than 4. In so I can see arguments for Witchstalker (I know I've been critical of it but that's because it is much better role player than all around card). Personally I think Dreg Mangler if supportable is about the best option.
I'd definitely look at designing your board in this way. Looking at threats instead of answers primarily. We just need to make them general. Still cards that are quick and lower curve are also good against decks we need to race or decks that bodies in front make a difference. Like Witchstalker and Dreg Mangler are both good against Burn. Most threats good against Mono Black are also upgrades against control.
The biggest conflict is a lot of what I'm suggesting to make slots for suggests that maxing out Ghor Clan or running Flesh/Blood isn't an option. Given the state of things I think it's a must. But that's the oomph factor this deck provides, even if it isn't the best here and is a bit inconsistent (this is why I largely think Jund, and Monsters in general has been going out of flavour). Without this element the deck has a huge potential to just do nothing in the mirror. This line always leads to other go big spells like Rados's Return and Sire of Insanity but neither is particularly good and maintaining momentum. I'm not sure the current card pool has it. But unless the lists adapt atleast to the top decks right now, I'm not sure when the metagame natural comes back around to accomodate. The GR exodus hasn't translated to top 8's. Maybe there is still something here.
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I lost 3 rounds - round 1 to a monoblack pilot (accomplished regional player) who went on to win the event and then back-to-back win-and-in matches at the end of the day to Gruul Blitz (similar to Ross's list - very explosive - I took 18 damage on turn 4 game 1!) and Junk Midrange (similar to Reid Duke's list piloted by a player who has won a Classic and made finals of an Open). Each of these opponents made top 8 - so I guess I have that going for the performance at least ... I was probably also a little too relaxed after having done really well and feeling like 'luck' was on my side last weekend.
Reaper of the Wilds was nothing special but probably the diversity of threats is better than a fourth Ghor-Clan Rampager and third Xenagos, the Reveler in most games - as I've said, I thought I should try it with only two copies again as it's theoretically pretty good against a lot of the smaller aggro decks and can block Lifebane Zombie if it makes it into play.
I tried the fourth Courser of Kruphix since the life gain and four toughness was so good against all of the small aggro decks two weekends ago - played against midrange and control all day except getting blown out by Rg blitz.
See ryansolid's post (Though I will say, I found the singleton Swamp to be bad at times even when it was largely there as a Borderland Ranger target during a previous standard season) to see why I'm down to a 3/2 split on scry-lands to get extra basic lands in the deck - the manabase becomes more interesting with spoiled cards, but the format could change enough that the deck is largely irrelevant by then.
I've strongly considered flip-flopping to full-on Jund Midrange (board control) main and additional aggressive cards and Domri Rade in the sideboard. We're still the beatdown against the two top decks - UWx control and Bx control; but we need the removal against most of the rest of the metagame. However, I'm still an aggressive midrange player at heart so probably not ...
Other changes for you all to consider for any events you all might have coming up, I really do think I want a third Putrefy in the deck - maybe the third copy of Thoughtseize or Mizzium Mortars is unnecessary - perhaps ryansolid is right that the sideboard needs more threats and less answers. I still haven't gotten the Primeval Bounty into play (eats a lot of opposing Thoughtseizes), but I think I still like it better than Sire of Insanity (since I have Rakdos's Return main) and willing to keep trying it over Garruk, Caller of Beasts for a little while longer. I'm probably finished with standard for a while (SCG spring states?) - I'll keep trying to keep this curated as necessary but do not plan on playing in any more bigger events for several weeks as I tend to family and other real-life obligations. There are three SCG Opens (Cincy, Knoxville, Indy) within driving distance over the next month or so, but I don't think I'm going to be able to make it to any of them.
So I guess it's getting to that time to talk about mana bases again (when do I ever stop? I am always looking at Mana as I think it is the most important thing for sure). I mean the ideal for fixing is:
14 T1 Green Sources, around 17 G altogether
Atleast 14 Red Sources
The black is more interesting depending on need. Single black 4 drop we want about 12. Single Black 3 drop postboard 13. Double Black 4 drop we want maybe as high as 16 (14 is fine, realistically but we are being ideal). 16 Black would be Downfall, but I think there is very little need for that. Double Cost at 5 12 would be fine but if you want to really depend on it let's say as high as 14. So let's say idealized 14 Black Sources and we go from there.
The most obvious thing would be to jam 4 Mana Confluence but that is almost too easy. I mean if you want to play Mutavault that seems reasonable, but I think Mana Confluence actually reduces the need for it. Maybe as a one of but honestly I'd just rather curve. I mean if you are curving that tight why bother putting any mana into the vault until very late game and at that point what is the point.
I mean this gives you 16 Green, 16 T1, 15 Red and 14 Black. We really aren't taking a ton of pain here anyway and we aren't any worse to Burning Earth (we are playing just as many basics). What Confluence does more than anything is make the 3rd color playable as more than a light splash. It barely affects 2 color base 2 color decks. It gives an extra fixer if they want to adjust their Temple numbers, but at that point the 3rd color really does come for very little (maybe even the 4th color).
Trading any card in there for the 4th confluence might just be right anyway. Like trade a forest and you get an extra red and black sourrce, trade a mountain and you get an extra black and green source. You could play more Temple's but why?
The biggest difference by far is that on T2 after a Mystic there is almost no question if you can slam the Domri. Having only 3 Temple's mean the likelihood of being forced to play taplands early when you don't want to is much lessened. This actually has a fairly profound effect similarly after Caryatid. I started jamming lists with the above mana base and while it felt like a pure upgrade it made question if I could do more with the curve since it was so much less constrained. One option might simply be go to 23 lands. This is actually fairly reasonable with this mana base. A lot of GR lists did it before but we couldn't really for fixing reasons. I mean cut that mountain (adjust a temple around etc) and what do you really lose? Another option is to play more 5 drops. Mystic Carytid draws are way more likely to happen now without hitting a tapland (ie tightly curving to 5 mana on T3). Mind you finding a 5 that is as good on it's own is a bit of a challenge I think. Stuff like Herald or Xenagod don't play to these jump ahead approaches nearly as well as say a Stormbreath Dragon. And the tricky part is ideally this card would not be able to be hit by Lifebane Zombie (ie.. it's red or black).
The profound impact of this is not only being able to play more 5's but that it encourages playing more 3's + 2 drop removal. Since 1-3 is better you want more impactful 3's. If anything this takes a lot of pressure off the 4 mana slot. However, if this is the game plan that causes a huge fundamental shift. Like Mono Black and Control is a lot less awkward if you are pushing 3 drops (instead of 4's) which means less of a reliance perhaps on expensive 6 mana effects. Either way it's hard to fully grasp the implications. But while I'm not sure this set gives us a bunch of new cards once you adjust the mana you may find it actually changes everything.
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EDIT: After more testing, I'm not even sure if we want any Temples if we go the other way I'm talking about. Think about how much more potent Courser gets when you untap if you know the land off the top is untapped. That if you go, T1 Elf, T2 Domri, T3 Courser, T4 you are almost guarenteed to hit your 5th source untapped. Or even.. T2 Caryatid, T3 Courser, T4 Domri + Dreadbore.. The odds are so much better if you untap on T4 and don't have your 4th land, but see a creature on top of your deck, that drawing with Domri means playing Dreadbore that turn as well. That sequence is like drawing 2 cards, and playing 2 high impact spells on T4. The odds of curving out like that before with Temples was hard. The chances with even 5 temples of being able to use all your mana 3 turns in a row in the early turns is very much hampered (mind you T3 Courser off Caryatid is still a place to play a tapland).
Basically Elvish Mystic just got way better. How about a line reminiscent of last years Jund Deck. Like T1 Mystic, T2 Dreg Manger, T3 Exava.. T4 Courser.. Land off the top hold up Ghor Clan Rampager. One Temple doesn't make that sequence possible. On the play that line is deadly. There aren't any decks ramping into Desecration Demon as of yet really (although that may change). So being able to get in for 10 before the opponent gets to do much of anything. Like let's say T1 they play a tapland.. T2 they play a shock and Caryatid (now they are 15).. They untap T3 at 8 if they didn't block. They drop a Polukranos. You hit them for 7 killing their Polukranos.. There is no coming back. I mean even Dragon off the top and knock them to 4. It's not like they can attack. Being unable to go 1, 3, 4, 5 with the right hand is the reason this deck has never had a goldfish and leads to the awkwardness of wanting those big spells. I'm not saying it happens all the time, but as long as it is available enough even.. 2, 4, 5, 6 or 2, 4, 5, 3/3.. etc.. it makes a huge difference. Some hands just say go for it, and any little slip up (like a tapped land) can make that impractical.
So let's consider this mana base with zero Temples as another extreme.
That's still 16 G, 14 R, 14 B. I'm not saying you need all that black. But it's sufficient Black to say play Dreg Mangler and Domri Rade in the same deck if you so wished. Even close to sufficient Red Black to play Spike Jester (I think, I'd want 15 of each). There are some people looking into more hyper aggro decks like that but I think it's still bit poor since it only takes Golgari Charm and some Abrupt Decays to send those decks back to nothing. I think you have to be a bit bigger (not much but a bit). If it ever got really bad there is Anger.
I'm not sure what to do exactly with this knowledge but this takes care of half of the awkwardness I was talking about in Monsters. It was NEVER the fixing it was the curving. Of course we can't find another one drop accelerator to save our life. That would take care of the rest of it. I mean seriously is Wizards just making fun of us.. how many 2 mana creatures that produce 1 mana have they printed in the past year (there is even another one in the new set)? 7? How many see play? It takes something as good as Sylvan Caryatid for it generally to be worth it especially as the formats get stronger. I almost would play a 0/1 illusion dork without flying that produced colorless mana that shocked yourself for 1 every time you tapped for mana at this point. I guess it's just pretty obvious that something like Birds of Paradise would just ruin the format they are trying to build.
I wanted to leave this thread with a conclusion before Journey to Nyx pre-releases this weekend. As I've previously mentioned, the amount of reactive control cards in my sideboard has just kept increasing, and I spent a majority of games 2 and 3 at the IQ that I won with the deck configured as more of a traditional Jund Midrange deck with lots of board control elements - within the current metagame, there are just a lot of decks that are even more aggressive (monoblue, red/x aggro, Boros burn).
I've strongly considered flip-flopping to full-on Jund Midrange (board control) main and additional aggressive cards and Domri Rade in the sideboard. We're still the beatdown against the two top decks - UWx control and Bx control; but we need the removal against most of the rest of the metagame. However, I'm still an aggressive midrange player at heart so probably not ...
The idea is to play basically the same 75 cards but update maindeck/sideboard placements to start game 1 closer to what my deck was looking like after sideboarding in match-ups where I'm clearly not the beatdown as there seemed to be more and more games where I was wanting all the removal. I was not necessarily looking to go full-on Matt Costa or Tom Ross Jund from early in the season. With extremely limited testing, here's where I currently am:
or maybe something in between ... I did like having the ability to still play Domri game 1 despite being creature light in theory - perhaps the Underworld Connections should be Read the Bones (pair in the main) to settle several questions. Also, I really tried to find room for a singleton Whip of Erebos somewhere in there as I've seen it as a one-of in Jund Monsters lists and like the idea of also using 'team gains lifelink' to help offset life-loss even more than ScOoze and Courser already should ...
The only other card completely new to the 75 is Rakdos Keyrune. Rakdos Keyrune fits the older 1-3-5 ramp plan, can play the animate to attack/block role perhaps even better than Mutavault, and can essentially convert green mana to red or black. Turn 1 Elvish Mystic into Turn 2 Rakdos Keyrune + Thoughtseize seems like a fairly slick opening. The keyrune wasn't much of a consideration in the Monsters version where you rarely had the open mana to animate and attack in the early game, but here it can help you get to 4-5 mana and/or block.
Full disclosure: There's a Versus Video going up on SCG tomorrow that includes CVM piloting some sort of Jund Midrange deck (a more traditional build).
EDIT: Forgot to mention how hard I've been working to try to balance the manabase won't matter once we have Temple of Malady and Mana Confluence.
Hm... That sort of list would almost certainly need a sweeper I think. You have the mortars out of your board but it's tough to keep up on one for ones with the card advantage suite since Domri is pretty poor in that capacity here. You cut down your top end creature threats and are playing more ramp. Domri feels like it's out of place and you should shore up Connections/Read the Bones. 19 Creatures main and 24 max post suggests that Domri doesn't fit very well at all. I think this is the biggest reason we haven't seen this bridging. Mostly that decks that go this way desperately want to play Anger of the Gods and while having say 4 Caryatids seems acceptable having 10 spells in that range less so. The biggest risk is the number of hands that are removal, removal, Elf, Courser, 3 lands. It's quite possible to get beaten to the board and then flood. The hope is that the blocking game works, which is fine until you hit like Mono Black or control. I realize the motivation was all the aggro you been facing. But as long as the opposing aggro opponent isn't trying to Ghor Clan you it just really takes one reversal on removal, one combat trick to make a deck like this very far behind and unable to recover. There is no Gray Merchant. Everything else takes time.
Mind you as you say this may not matter much at all very soon. The effects of Mana Confluence run a lot deeper than fixing. It drastically changes how you want to build your curve, and when you take that into consideration with other decks, I think it's more likely than not cards like Rakdos' Return get a lot worse as while they can be cast a bit earlier for bigger, the time criticalness becomes even more of a thing since it's much easier for them to miss their relevant window. There will likely be very aggressive decks that don't care about their own life total and be able to easily fight through a Courser of Kruphix/Sylvan Caryatid (not as likely til now since early powerful threats were locked by splits costs and awkwardness on curves). This means the generally slow build up and one for one til you find something good won't be as good I believe. Reaper of the Wilds gets worse, Polukranos gets a bit worse. Sylvan Caryatid gets a bit worse. I'm interested to see where that leads.
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I'm pretty sure now the correct number of temples is non-zero. Unfortunately we need the scry. It's as simple as the fact the top end is still so low impact. You can curve down but you tend to flood on sources. You can cut sources but then you hurt Courser as a CA engine. That may be fine and you can cut down Courser but it's some of little value you have and you become a slow aggro deck(since aggro decks have gotten faster). I actually tried a direct port of last year's gyre sage fueled Unfriendly Skies and it was almost good enough. Mortars is no Bonfire. It becomes especially obvious against control but attacking with 2 drops almost does it. I think this might be due to the format going more towards this time last year. Domri is becoming worse again. I'd kill for a Borderland Ranger but Courser will do.
The other option is go a bit ambitious with curve but the payout is still variable. Not having scry ends up hurting more in the long run. I realised that when trying Reaper again as I cut him from all early sketches because I anticipate him being much worse. I couldn't believe how much I appreciated the scry. Not to say Reaper is good. Just we need certain elements of card selection to keep the density up since the top end itself has limited shelf life.
In general with Domri getting worse again I wonder if the result is a fundamental change of focus. Still taking a standard build and ignoring this while I think 5 temples are too many I think 2-3 might be necessary.
EDIT I realize that Borderland Ranger comment might sound weird. I mean Courser is a better card right? It just like everything else in this format isn't immediate(unless it's behind curve). This lack of immediacy is a large reason for why things don't quite mesh for us. Generally I'd rather have Courser probably, but at this point I'd probably take anything guaranteed to do something relevant on ETB.
Temple of Malady is the least important of the Scrylands for us for sure. I have to admit I didn't see any of the rounds he played against aggro, but when he played against Mono Black early on the Scrylands cost him game 2 and almost Game 3. He pulled out of it by drawing a Stormbreath on time, but it was the difference of getting Xenagos online with his 4th land. Outside of mana I am in agreement the list doesn't need much changing at all. But I can't see how 6 Temples is right. I understand the desire to Scry. It's why I play Reaper as a 2 of these days (I am not blind to the fact Reaper isn't a particularly good card), simply that I think it's better to run out a 4 drop at potential value than not be able to cast it cause of a Temple.
Truthfully, I think Jund Monsters is particularly good week 1 and week 2, just because it has a good anti aggro game while be being good against the midrange decks when they focus on killing little dudes. If you remember the first 3 weeks after BNG this was the case. Once control and bigger midrange finds the right balance it's harder. I think things will be a bit different this time around because I think there are enough tools for GW decks to actually occupy some of the same space as us (more specifically Junk) which takes off some of the heat. At that point our make up might change a little (as I think Junk and bigger GW decks in general are a bit of a weakness as I was lamenting about 3-4 weeks post BNG, before they disapeared last time), but I think the stock list will be good for atleast another week or so (as I hinted towards at the end of my last post).
I'm honestly a little surprised they didn't want a couple Mana Confluence. I don't think Jund Monsters wants 4 or even 3. But 2 seems about right. One of those lands will do about 4 damage to you during the course of a game which is like playing a couple extra shocklands to be sure. But curving tightly can make such a big difference. Mind you I think it doesn't play nice with Mutavault, so I can see the argument for not playing it if Mutavault feels super important. That might be the difference. But I mean BDD's ability to T2 Domri off Elf is pretty bad (worse than most). He has to have one of 7 lands.. That number should be more like 12.. But maybe Domri's awkwardness is just a strike against Domri. In short I think his mana is pretty bad and it isn't a direction we can keep going. Kibler went 6 scrylands right before he gave up on the deck. You need it for the fixing but it's awkward as hell. We finally have a chance to fix our mana but we get this.
I think what we witnessed was a good player, playing a well positioned deck, with a fairly tried and true list. However, I think as the format shakes out this manabase will not be acceptable. I know it's been fine, but there is a real risk to get overrun by decks that just curve better once they shake out.
That's 16 G, 14 R, 13 B. So far my favorite part of this list is that it only goes down to 25 Creatures against control. This means that there is no consistency issues with Domri or Garruk. It's possible I want one more Golgari Charm/Abrupt Decay or one of those Exava or Mistcutter's becomes a Xenagos since my postboard plan against control is particularly bad to Blind Obediance. Mind you this is all built off the premise that you don't want to over sideboard black removal against black decks. I am largely missing Putrefies. I think there is this awkwardness where they just strip your hand of removal depending on your draw. My hope is to present a board fast enough that they have a hard time keeping up and that their Lifebane largely misses over 4 mana. As for Doom Blade/Ultimate Price pretend those Cyclonic Rifts in the board are those and I think we'll be on the same page of how I board these days.
EDIT 2: After seeing Cannon's List and wanting to try 23 lands I'm thinking this. Confluence looks a touch more appealing with a lower land count.
I get your reasons for wanting the 4th color, but you haven't convinced me it's worth it. You may not perceive the consistency loss as being an issue, but I guarantee it would be very noticeable at a large event with 8+ rounds. If you really want to run powerful spells in all the colors, I'd just take after Zvi and go all-in, rather than clinging too tightly to a tried-and-true shell like G/R.
RGB Jund BGR
WGB Junk/Abzan Company WGB
LEGACY
RUGB Delver GURB
EDH
UW Geist of Saint Traft Aggro-Control WU
RUG Riku of Two Reflections Combo GUR
BBB Skithiryx Control BB
Sure. However, I do want to point out I overload Rift most of the time I play it. The times I don't it is really the instant speed/hit anything that is more relevant but I mean I play 2 in the list. I see it like once in 4 games or something and overload 3/4 times. It is considerably better than overloading Mortars against other decks that play big creatures.. Mostly green decks. Sometimes you just need that window. It's fine I'm catering to a very specific line. I can see how you might say it's like playing DoJ in a white weenie deck that has a mechanism to make it's creatures indestructible for a turn. Basically there are situations you aren't supposed to be able to dig yourself out of in certain decks. I just find the curve inconsistency of the current green decks being such a pain having some use for the game going longer and flooding a bit is good. Something like Mutavault is a bit under our average quality of card to really take advantage of.
It's possible I have too many black sources. I mean I don't think CVM's list supports those sideboard Thoughtseizes well. The reason I have Watery Grave is that I was playing heavier black recently and moved back from it. However, I don't think more than 13 red is really necessary either. If you made Watery Grave and Deceit Swamps, and traded all the other blue duals for their basic counterparts that's basically what I was playing before. The blue literally cost me nothing compared to the mana setup I was playing previously. I mean we played Falkenrath last season with 13 red and like 10 black as a 4 of. If you want to talk about a card that needs to be played on time that's a great example. Both Izzet Charm and Notion Thief do need to be played on time, just not T2 and T4 respectively. Both are behind the curve answers which tend to get played later. For a tap out deck yes that doesn't make a ton of sense unless you in some matchups play the tempo or control role. Those are no harder for me to cast than CVM casting Dreadbore. Having some room to play around against more aggressive decks can open up different lines and give the deck more depth. I mean Golgari Charm against control is an example of playing the Tempo role. In those matchups we generally play a threat every turn until we can't and they proceed to deal with them. However, if we ever establish enough board and have enough mana we tend to hold Golgari Charm up. Mind as I said Notion Thief is an experiment. Izzet Charm has been good for me, Thief I played once and lost as drawing 3 cards didn't do enough. Mind you I probably misplayed an earlier Thoughtseize, taking Elspeth instead of their 2nd Rev. To me though Notion Thief has the potential to be sort of Restoration Angel like in that matchup. I didn't particularly like Resto against Control compared to say Hero of Bladehold at the time simply since Hero was so deal with me or die and Resto mostly promoted value only on the board (pre Thragtusk ridiculousness) but I'm really just theorizing.
I think the blue is addable on top of the 16 green, 13 red, 11 black mana base pretty easily if desired. Even with the same number of Scrylands. Ie the consistency loss is 4 extra life payed in many games. How often does that life matter? As I said I have to adjust my mana base just a slightly. I just deliberately lowered my green count to 14 to raise my black count and I think I went too far. I know from experience and past formats 14 green is sufficient for the whole deck minus Courser. It's enough to say mulligan any hand without a green source (I can provide multi Standard tournament winning lists over the past 8 years that support that claim). The thing is I don't think Monsters is consistent. That is what annoys me about this deck. I have bit biased expectations as I generally play this sort of deck in every Standard format. The deck is so awkward curve wise yet Caryatid and Scrylands are so essential that to me the cost of colour ambition pales considerably to how awkward curve is. What we need are some more potent cards. Right now (and largely why the deck has started to drop off) is that we are just trying to jam cards that are pretty good but actually in the scheme of things aren't that great, but we play enough that hopefully we take initiative and sort of get there. Like do you side in/keep in Xenagos against mono black. The card is a planeswalker so it's value but it also dies to a single Lifebane swing. How about Polukranos? It's that sort of thing. This deck doesn't feel like it has a good gold fish. More that if you draw your cards in the right order and the opponent doesn't or sequences their removal awkward you got it. There is no, Avacyn Pilgrim, Blade Splicer, Resto Angel, Gavony Township or Pilgrim, Mirran Crusader, Hero of Bladehold, Gavony Township. There is no Gyre Sage, BTE, Falkenrath, Thundermaw Hellkite, Bonfire for x = 3. Noble Hierach, Lotus Cobra, Fetch into Sovereign of Lost Alara. For these decks to be viable there are usually some sort of nut draw. We Mystic.. Caryatid (maybe Courser, Domri).. Stormbreath or Polukranos.. I mean there is no redundancy on the 1 mana ramp. There is no kill you 4 drop. Our big 5 drop takes 5 turns to win on it's own. It needs some sort of help. I think it needs some bigger swingy effects in some matchups that are specifically good in those matchups. In BR we have big discard effects like Rakdos's Return and Sire of Insanity. But I think their application is limited since everyone is sort of playing this off the top of your deck format (and not in a miracles way). Nothing is splashy and everything incremental. You have plenty of time to find answers. No I win cards or way to complete take tempo advantage in one stroke.
Anyway I know the blue splash isn't really all that interesting to most people here. However, I think we all feel that missing element. We've tried a lot of different stuff (some people dabbling into devotion etc). I've spent hundreds of hours with Jund and a few dozen with straight GR in this Standard Format since BNG came out (I also played variants before BNG but that is less relevant). I'm still working at it. I've definitely played novelty ideas that have hurt me in longer tournaments so I definitely can use the advice to stay closer to the standard. I have enough just missed top 8's in the larger local tournaments/ptqs where basically crapping out a whole round to mulligans might have made the difference. Then again maybe I was unlucky there and lucky somewhere else (it's always memorable when you win with the novel tech, even if it's possibly incorrect). I think the blue splash is interesting and I think with a bit more work on the mana base and the sideboard it has some potential.
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
If you've played it for as long as you say, that obviously you have your reasons to stray from the "Norm", but I was mostly pointing out the issues I perceive with your 4-color mana base for the sake of the others on this thread. *crickets*
I think you could easily play a 4-color deck that resembles Jund Monsters, but with a more stable mana base and perhaps an even more powerful plan. But I really think you aren't gaining more than you are losing by trying to combine Discard with counterspells and instant speed effects in a 4-color deck that's essentially just Big Midrange Aggro at heart. While I see the appeal of some instant speed tricks like Charm and Rift, I really think the discard spells will do just as much in helping you win the game without twisting your mana to uncomfortable levels.
Losing 4 extra life per game to even more shocklands, and having to run even more (off-color) Temples is just super awkward when we already clearly have some issues curving out. Not to mention there are decks that will just kill you if you pay too much life for stuff like shocklands and Thoughtseize.
RGB Jund BGR
WGB Junk/Abzan Company WGB
LEGACY
RUGB Delver GURB
EDH
UW Geist of Saint Traft Aggro-Control WU
RUG Riku of Two Reflections Combo GUR
BBB Skithiryx Control BB
The mana base was no worse than any green 3 colour base. As I pointed out I could basically mimic Kiblers colour requirements with equal number of scry lands and actually have more of each colour than CVM + have blue. Ie. 16G, 13R, 11B, 8U. Other than life mutavault was the cost and truthfully I find it not impressive in these lists at all. We play it to tray to get some more value out of our lands but it is often so little. Even now I think I'd rather play less scry lands to get my colours. It's definitely tricky since scrylands help you not flood but the early cost is so brutal. As I said this is why I wanted to try 4 colours. We are already paying the cost in scry lands and awkward curve. That is the cause of the consistency issues not colours. Adding the blue did not affect in anyway the playing of non-blue cards on time (outside of life concerns, which was a lot harder to gauge on cost then one might expect). Basically the biggest cost of the blue potentially was having a blue spell in hand and not being able to cast since there were only 9 sources + Caryatid. This pretty much never happened since there were rarely more than 2 blue cards in my deck in a given matchup, so getting jammed on blue was not an issue. By the time you need it, it's generally there. If there was good enough tools then it would be worth it, I think. Ultimately Rift was the only effect I couldn't get a close enough elsewhere. Izzet Charm was used more as shock than as Spell Pierce. It was better against burn than anywhere else. I only ever used the 3rd mode once to pull a Golgari Charm off the top my deck revealed by Courser agaist White Weenie. Notion Thief is too cute. You have to already be playing on that axis for it to matter.
The reason for the long rant about other formats is simply how I build. I care very little about the cards, but what I need the deck to do. Then I find the cards that fit that need. Obviously the need slightly moves Standard Format to Standard Format and what we can do changes too, but the same patterns emerge over and over. This GRx deck is lacking one piece significantly. The black splash is way more relevant than the blue. The RUG deck has more serious issues. Sometimes you have to go deep to find it. Not every format is very accomodating to these strategies. Pre-Huntmaster Delver Standard I was working on Naya and people had given on GW because of how awkward that matchup was with Gut Shot and Vapor Snag. I played Kemba Skyguard main deck and didn't lose to Delver all day at the CMT (Canadian Magic Tournament Series.. we don't get SCG up here). I came in 9th, mind you as I lost to Wolf Run Ramp in the last round (I would have drawn but my opponent wasn't sure if he would make it in). The point was I was basically looking for Huntmaster of the Fells before I knew it existed and went with what I could make work.
What Monsters need? Well the accelerator curve and scry lands prevents us from being legitimately aggressive enough across matchups. The main reason is individually our finishers suck. As big as our 4 drops are, we're basically playing vanilla creatures asking to be two for oned. Notice how all the 5 drops minus Arbor Colossus and Underworld Cerberus are 4/4 max. Those creatures play out so Vanilla you don't even want to play them in this high removal metagame. This is part of what makes RUG awkward. Insufficient power on curve. As good as Prophet is, it's a 5 mana 2/3. Simic creatures are small. So we desperately need something to funnel our mana into. Like some manlands. But Mutavault is so under our curve it's pretty difficult. So what do we do we use Discard when things go the other way. We try to keep them off their game, but it costs them no investment. This format is played largely off the top of the deck. Discard is too slow, unless you are curving out just right. Not that permission is really reasonable, as Supreme Verdict makes it just awkward enough (not to mention Simic's anemic creatures) that it's dragging into a game we can't win against larger decks. Thoughtseize is always going to be better against us than for us since we can't play enough removal backup since we invest so many cards in mana. We generally empty our hands with ramp, leaving the key targets left in the hand for the picking. Against other decks it's much more incremental. We need a way to leverage our board into a 'I Win' situation. People were playing Flesh/Blood for this but any thing that relies on targetting any one creature is dangerous. I understand why there is no Overrun in a format with mono green devotion, but we want Overrun, or at the very least an unmatchable equipment. This is what led me to looking at Chromanticore since as far as aura's go.. but 7 is too much for something that targets. We need this thing to be 5 maybe 6 tops if it is individually focused. Bestow is too expensive to not be fairly conditional. Overload is too by that measure but it is a one sided mass effect. I mean if you aren't super fast, how do anything as swinging to compete with Supreme Verdict or Sphinx's Rev, Elspeth, Master of Waves, Gray Merchant of Asphodel, Fanatic of Mogis. We have Rakdos' Return. Look how it lines up against those. Green has Garruk, I guess, but it still takes 2 turns to really turn it around. Talk about insult to injury, Stormbreath can't even one shot a freshly played Elspeth.. We can have a board and they can potentially tap out without much concern. They generally don't since they can wait and be safer but that's just how absurd the balance is. It's also intentional I'm sure from WotC design perspective. If there is a solution I'm convinced it will be a bit out of the box. I'm convinced Jund is the closest but how the fill the gaps is challenge I will continue to explore.
-------------------------
Anyway This is what I'm currently trying. I still have the blue splash but I've lessened it and set myself up to play only 4 scrylands and 4 basics. 4 basics seems about right to avoid that critical life loss I was talking about. The mana is 15, 12, 12, 4. Mind you I only bring Rift in matchups that Caryatid doesn't die (ie Green, Mono Blue, Mono White etc.. so I think I can pretty solidly consider the blue at 8). Against Burn, and Control (but not usually mono black.. maybe..) I bring in Dreg Mangler. I like Dreg Mangler and Exava simply in that they dodge the black removal esper brings in to kill Mistcutter Hydra, and they are on curve where Hydra is a turn behind. I've found that Hydra doesn't do very much these days. Sure it's good against mono blue but I have so many sweeping effects there (Golgari Charm, Mortars, Rift) that I tend to not need that gimmick as much. Anyway basically the idea is in some matchups the full playset of Coursers are a liability and in other matchups you want to curve down a bit. I played Vraska in the past but I love Vraska much more now that I'm supplementing with other removal. Garruk I still find very key against Mono Black. That's definitely where it's at it's best. Although Game 1 against green decks Garruk is pretty good. Basically decent against most midrange strategies. I'm giving some stuff CVM suggested a try like main decking a Sire. It hasn't been great but it hasn't been bad either. It's given me weird avenues to outplay my opponent.
4 Stomping Ground
4 Blood Crypt
2 Breeding Pool
4 Overgrown Tomb
1 Steam Vents
1 Watery Grave
1 Temple of Abandon
3 Temple of Malice
4 Forest
Creatures(27):
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Sylvan Caryatid
3 Scavenging Ooze
4 Courser of Kruphix
3 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Reaper of the Wilds
1 Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch
4 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Herald of Torment
3 Domri Rade
1 Vraska, the Unseen
1 Garruk, Caller of the Beasts
Other(4):
2 Mizzium Mortars
2 Dreadbore
2 Thougthseize
3 Cyclonic Rift
3 Golgari Charm
3 Dreg Mangler
1 Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch
1 Chandra, Pyromaster
1 Vraska, the Unseen
1 Sire of Insanity
Online seems to be all Black and Esper right now I've been getting tons of practice I think the sideboard plan like this is working a lot better for me. I'm also 2-0 against burn so far.
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
If splashing blue is primarily for Cyclonic Rift, I'm curious as to why only 2 copies total? We know Notion Thief isn't the best card for this deck, and I can't imagine Izzet Charm is better than something like Abrupt Decay or Dreadbore, so it really does seem like Cyclonic Rift is your primary pull to Blue. I get that it does things that no other card does, but I still doubt it is worth the consistency issues of the deck.
Part of the battle with Standard is picking out what you want to succeed against. I think it would be better to target a specific meta, and thus tune your maindeck and sideboard to beat those archetypes, than to be all over the place with colors in what is meant to be a very streamlined 2-color deck.
Again, not trying to dissuade you to try new things, or to run a 4-color deck with a variety of powerful spells, I'm just pointing out that it's a bit outside the realm of consistency for this archetype.
RGB Jund BGR
WGB Junk/Abzan Company WGB
LEGACY
RUGB Delver GURB
EDH
UW Geist of Saint Traft Aggro-Control WU
RUG Riku of Two Reflections Combo GUR
BBB Skithiryx Control BB
It's worse because of the life.. But just using the example's given above.. like Kibler 6 temples.. 2 off colour lands that can't cast mystic (Mountain, Mutavault). The cost is the 6 shocks. The life loss is the only difference. You are just as likely to have all your colours on time. There is no consistency issue if you are willing to pay 2 life (unless theoretical you could get a hand jammed with blue cards). In terms of getting your Green, Red, and Black Sources, it's exactly the same. I was curious if the life mattered. Yes it does. Seems obvious, but it didn't matter where I expected or actually as much. If there weren't Gray Merchant in the format I think it would be feasible or say if Stormbreath was a 5/5. It's really that close I believe. But we need every small margin we can get.
Cyclonic Rift's draw is it saved me from playing a bunch of different sideboard card. It basically lets me run less Doom Blades, Ultimate Price, not have to go into Anger of the Gods, Bile Blight territory, or even Gaze of Granite, Gruul Charm, or Devour Flesh. Basically my problem when I was playing Jund Monsters was I couldn't beat GW, and I was having trouble with UW. I think I've figured out how to handle the control matchup better. But since that time GB Dredge, and some GU variants have appeared. I basically came on here and asked how do people beat GW. There was some talk of Lifebane, but without the rest of the black support shell I found it inadequate. I play mostly online so I guess I could just metagame for that, but I don't like having any really bad matchups if I can avoid it. I mean there is always Hexproof when you don't draw the hate cards. Basically my biggest issue is this deck is just awkward enough to lose to even worse decks that are more awkward but are also more ambitious. Decks that shouldn't be able to win very much but just have some gimmick. More often than not all of that category (including the mirror) lose to just some stupid big effect. It's the most frustrating scenario to play in since our big effects are not good enough. Losing to random bad decks shouldn't be something a tier one deck should have to worry about. A deck crafted in way that should hate on us like Mono Black or Blue sure or Hexproof which comes on a different angle efficiently... But some random Progenitor Mimic deck or some white weenie deck that hard casts Angel of Serenity sometimes. I mean that's I've actually tested a lot of these random ideas, and quickly recognized they weren't good enough, but they can be good enough to beat our collection of pretty decent cards.
It feels like Jund Monsters is positioned to beat Aggro, and have a decent Devotion matchup. It can be heavily boarded to beat control, but it's sort of bad against random strategy x. That always eventually catches up with popular decks. Having a 3rd Rift seems interesting option. Right now I have yet to draw Chandra or Izzet Charm since I went down to one. It's possible I should just consolidate some numbers.
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
Kibler seems to be going back and forth. He is on straight GR now. Ultimately it was the mana for him. He first started cutting down his black content so he can play less scry lands. I think this is potentially a good move. Going to 4 Scrylands at the cost of cutting down to 1 Mutavault at 24 lands to fill your colour for the sake of curving seems like a reasonable idea. Of course this means he's back on Ghor Clan over Reaper even in his Jund list which he says he abandoned. His concern seemed to be that his 1-3 Mystic Draws weren't consistent with only 10 black sources in the lands. Even if he drew the black source T3 only 8 would be playable. Under that logic I can see why 12 would actually be the minimum in land and where counting Caryatid doesn't apply. Our Mystic draws have the potential to be better than every deck in the format and he wanted to maximize for that. Mind you maybe he's just being a bit overzealous with his red sources. 15 seems like a lot. CVM only plays 13. So it could be addressable perhaps. He left it at this:
4 Elvish Mystic
3 Ghor-Clan Rampager
3 Scavenging Ooze
4 Stormbreath Dragon
4 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Courser of Kruphix
3 Polukranos, World Eater
Planeswalkers (7)
4 Domri Rade
1 Vraska the Unseen
2 Xenagos, the Reveler
4 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Blood Crypt
1 Mutavault
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Stomping Ground
4 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Malice
Spells (4)
3 Dreadbore
1 Mizzium Mortars
2 Mistcutter Hydra
2 Sire of Insanity
2 Golgari Charm
2 Ultimate Price
1 Hammer of Purphoros
2 Chandra, Pyromaster
1 Vraska the Unseen
1 Mizzium Mortars
2 Thoughtseize
The Hammer he said is an experiment everything else looks standard. I guess he was looking for a cheaper version of Xenagod.. Xenagod really is in direct competition with the weapons. They both just sit there and have some general effect, but at 5 is a lot later. Mind you in Kibler's GR list he gushes about Xenagod.
CVM on the otherhand said he liked everything about his main deck from last week except the full set of Ghor Clan and he likes Kibler's Vraska inclusion. He goes in a bit into Courser but he still is on that less than 4 is correct. Otherwise he's pretty set on his list.. He's thinking Vraska for Garruk, and 1 Reaper for a Ghor Clan or possibly 2 Reaper for Ghor Clan and an Ooze. It's interesting because from the way he wants to cut it sounds like he feels he is still hitting a lot of air in his list which only has 23 lands. It might simply be due to the number of Xenagos which are difficult to leverage when you aren't ahead and his Ghor Clans feel more like 2 drops than valid 4's so he finds himself holding them and not wanting to cast them as much which sort makes the impact of certain cards reduce. It's just speculation but that's the impression I get from what he's describing.
Also interesting he's very high on Thoughtseize and is even considering cutting additional Hydra's for more copies. That's something I can relate to. He said he was boarding it in all the time. Mind you it's easy to see why you wouldn't want them main. I think it isn't because it isn't generally good but that it only works postboard when we can specialize. Almost like our main deck plan can't leverage Thoughtseize as well. I've found mind you overloading on Thoughtseize against control dangerous. I mean it can be really good, but we do still need to runner runner often enough that it's dangerous. I think the key is to not play the full 4.. 2 maybe 3, but maybe depending on your hand actually hold them til the turn before your opponent can make the big play.. Against a lot midrange decks that means before their T4.. If you can make Accel Dormi/Courser + Thoughtseize work you are in good shape usually. Against Control unless we are all in on dorks I actually think before their T5 is timing probably. Maybe T6.. Although against control I guess it's really a matter of fitting in where ever have room. Our mana forces Thoughtseize later anyway, so that compliments not going too crazy with it anyway.
It's interesting where their opinions meet and they seperate. Or where they were once in agreement and switched. Or where their positions have swapped with each other etc.. I think it says something interesting about the feel of this format.
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
I have been siding in Thoughtseize and Rakdos's Return and hoping to wipe out their hand before they wipe out mine and out card advantage them with Courser and planeswalkers.
Really? I've found that to be one of the easier matchups. I don't think I've ever lost a round against it. Planeswalkers, Dreadbores, and Mizzium Mortars are pretty key. I also think Rakdos's Return is pretty solid, since making them play in topdeck mode is pretty awful for them. I also sideboard 2 Putrefy, which takes care of Obzedat.
So when it comes to boarding for the most part I bring in most planeswalkers and gold creatures and side out expensive mono color or green creatures on top of bringing in more removal. The tricky part is both Xenagos and Chandra can be very good in the matchup but also can do near nothing. You still want them but it is a consideration. Beyond that awkwardness Vraska is very good, and I've found Garruk really good if you have it. Side out Polukranos, Ghor Clan if you can afford too (it's alot easier in lists that play Reaper, since you want to keep Reaper in). I'd argue that even shaving Dragons down a couple is reasonable. They tend to bring in Doom Blade and Ultimate Price. Let them use them on the Coursers. Black Gold Cards can be very good here since most lists aren't brining in the Dark Betrayals. Attacking their hand is good, but more so when you are ahead. The non-creature hand attacks compete with pure spot removal slots. It really depends on how you gauge your opponent to how you want to balance that. Some players take a more aggressive threat stance against us, and some still try to play the card grind game.
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
won 50ish person SCG IQ yesterday - traveled to my brother's home store for FNM and IQ the next day
My brother and I talk it out, and I change a few cards from my original plan - no Reaper of the Wilds at all, but I'm going to try maindeck Sire of Insanity as a six-drop instead of running Rakdos's Return as planned. I also like that this frees up spell slots for extra planeswalkers. He also gets me to try a third Xenagos, the Reveler again in the deck (I had been running three way back when)to ramp harder and it's not terrible against any common deck. I also swap the Garruk, Caller of Beasts to the sideboard for the Vraska the Unseen that's been hanging out there as it makes me feel better about only having two Dreadbore. In short, we end up on a modified form of CVM's build...
4 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Scavenging Ooze
3 Courser of Kruphix
4 Ghor-Clan Rampager
3 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Xenagos, God of Revels
2 Sire of Insanity
2 Dreadbore
3 Domri Rade
3 Xenagos, the Reveler
1 Chandra, Pyromaster
1 Vraska the Unseen
1 Mountain
4 Stomping Ground
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Blood Crypt
4 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Malice
1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts
1 Rakdos's Return
3 Thoughtseize
2 Golgari Charm
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Putrefy
3 Mizzium Mortars
you can watch me lose Round 1 of FNM against a version of Reid Duke's Junk Midrange on camera on ZachSellsMagic Twitch stream - it was an interesting match; I almost had game 1, won game 2, and game 3 was close as well
I do okay but nothing spectacular and put a little cash with a little store credit to finally get a fourth Stormbreath Dragon as planned; my brother was playing the same list within a few cards, so most importantly we have a lot of anecdotal data of how the deck might fare the next day.
We agree that Sire of Insanity is good but both like Rakdos's Return better - so I move two Return back into the main and a singleton Sire replaces the Return in the SB. I cut Xenagos, God of Revels as a pseudo-dragon and run a fourth copy of the real thing. I'm not sold on the third Xenagos, the Reveler but leave it as the +1 can lead to some pretty ridiculous turns 4-6 where you're playing either two threats or a big Rakdos's Return to protect the board you've developed. At the last minute, I also buy a Primeval Bounty and throw it in the sideboard for the Sire of Insanity since I'm boarding into Jund Control in a lot more match-ups than a month or two ago (sided it in a few times never drew it so not sure if I like it anymore than just in theory). I register this:
4 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Scavenging Ooze
3 Courser of Kruphix
4 Ghor-Clan Rampager
3 Polukranos, World Eater
4 Stormbreath Dragon
2 Dreadbore
2 Rakdos's Return
3 Domri Rade
3 Xenagos, the Reveler
1 Chandra, Pyromaster
1 Vraska the Unseen
5 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Stomping Ground
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Blood Crypt
4 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Malice
1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts
1 Primeval Bounty
3 Thoughtseize
2 Golgari Charm
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Putrefy
3 Mizzium Mortars
I start 3-0 (see ZachSellsMagic on Twitch another time to see my third round win - another interesting match but this time against BW midrange - EDIT: skip to around 2.5 hours into it), lose round 4 to the Rg devotion pilot who ended my FNM, and then get paired up against an undefeated opponent (there were only three at that point and the other two quickly announce intentional draw) round 5 and win which lets me draw round 6 with the undefeated player I hadn't played yet into the top 8. Quarterfinals of top 8 are a rematch from the pair-up who is a Rw devotion player - he gets stuck on two lands and then also has to mulligan multiple times game 2. Semifinals are rematch against the Rg pilot who has rolled me two matches in a row, and he has mulligan problems game 3. The aggressive devotion decks (I also played monoblue once) are much easier to stabilize against when they start with less than 7 cards in hand AND you run Rakdos's Return and Thoughtseize - imagine that... The finals would've been against a college student playing Gruul Monsters not interested in the invite or packs - he offers a split where all he takes is most of the money and runs; I accept. I didn't get to play him either at FNM or that day - but he said his list was pretty much template. In my experience, it can be a bit of a coin flip at times - Xenagos, God of Revels seems to be how straight Gruul beats me most of the time.
If I were to play again this weekend, I think I would change the Chandra, Pyromaster (move to sideboard) to a second Vraska the Unseen and possibly find a way to squeeze a singleton Putrefy (keeping two in the sideboard) into the main - possibly by cutting the third Xenagos, the Reveler yet again. Both of these Golgari cards were just that spectacular this weekend. I also think I liked the deck better with two Mountain; I will probably trim the fourth Temple of Abandon for it since I'm running 5 Forest and don't want to give up a black source. Perhaps this is the next iteration ...
4 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Scavenging Ooze
3 Courser of Kruphix
4 Ghor-Clan Rampager
3 Polukranos, World Eater
4 Stormbreath Dragon
2 Dreadbore
2 Rakdos's Return
1 Putrefy
3 Domri Rade
2 Xenagos, the Reveler
2 Vraska the Unseen
2 Mountain
4 Stomping Ground
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Blood Crypt
3 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Malice
1 Chandra, Pyromaster
3 Thoughtseize
2 Golgari Charm
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Putrefy
3 Mizzium Mortars
If I weren't already so light on creatures, I could stomach trimming the fourth copy of Ghor-Clan Rampager to keep the third Xenagos, the Reveler. The ??? is a green six-drop either 1 Garruk, Caller of Beasts or 1 Primeval Bounty I suppose - Garruk has won me games before, but I at least want to get a Bounty in play a few times before I give up on my potential Stroke of Genius (sorry, couldn't resist). I guess I had better actually start getting some practice in with my Legacy deck too (a version of Loam Pox).
no problem - I started the thread with the intent of keeping it curated as long as the deck was relevant (did the same with Gruul Aggressive Midrange last Standard) - so it's nice to occasionally get a 'thanks' or a 'kudos' to be sure it's actually relevant to someone else (though I have found that basically blogging my tinkering with the decks has helped me understand and reflect on decision-making in terms of both deck-building/tinkering and gameplay) - too bad you couldn't win one more! if I were to go back to straight Gruul, I've been thinking a lot about Flesh//Blood and/or Pit Fight and/or Fall of the Hammer as pseudo-removal - were you running any of these?
as for my deck,
I wouldn't fault anyone for still liking Reaper of the Wilds enough to cut a Ghor-Clan Rampager (I was often siding a copy out) and a Polukranos, World Eater to the sideboard for the matches where it's really good - this also prevents me from trying to figure out which green grindy six-drop to run in the sideboard in the empty slot that I had said could be either Garruk, Caller of Beasts or Primeval Bounty. I might end up trying it this way next myself - possibly being able to block Lifebane Zombie isn't terrible.
I think grindy 6 drop describes it well. The slot that is. The go bigger plan basically comes down to that and every good option is grindy. Sire hasn't impressed me terribly either but being a creature is worth a lot. I'm not really sure what is best in that slot. My hunch is Garruk, but that's harder to support if you already have a ton of walkers. Reaper is terribly outclassed as a 6 drop so to speak. It's best as a 4 that gives the opponent incentive to try to kill it immediately. As a 4 mana 4/5 with possible upside it's pretty good, as a 6 drop it is good when fighting out on the ground matters or you are ahead. It's sort of like the Ghor Clan dilema. Ghor Clan isn't a very good 4 comparatively in this format (most 3 drops have equal or better stats), but ability to push initiative of your attacks with it or the threat of it is considerably better. Reaper isn't the type of card to sandbag unless you have a threat to play every turn before it, and you know the opponents follow up play won't reverse board. Sometimes it's better to play Reaper first if you have them on Demon. Anyway as a '6' Reaper's a bit disappointing the way Ghor Clan is at '4'. You don't mind having the flexibility but you expect a lot more from the slot.
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Of course the argument right now has everything to do with mana. And the very first question I pose is, does Mutavault actually do very much at all in Monster's decks? Are we sure the 5th scryland is worth it? To me the cost of each additional scry land is the most painful part of the Jund list. If people just stopped auto opting to 4 Temple of Abandon, and actually looked at the counts to try to make something balance there is no reason with 24 lands one could not make a better manabase with only 4 scry lands... Secondly 15 red sources? + Caryatid.. I don't get it at all. Chandra, Pyromaster in my mind is the biggest argument for that and even that is fine with 14 unless you really just have T3 it without a Caryatid. If you are not playing Chandra it is a bit ridiculous. Dragon needs like 12.. Even counting Caryatid as half sources the way you'd count BoP you can probably play Dragon in a deck with 10 red land sources. That's the minimum I suppose, but playing more than 13 (what you need so that you can T2 Domri) is completely unwarranted. Especially if you are in the not 4 Domri boat which is a real consideration given the way some lists are being built.
Seriously:
4 Stomping Ground
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Blood Crypt
2 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Malice
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
16 G, 13 R, 11 B.. This is enough to play single black cost 4 drops. Honestly you could go down to 15 g, and up to 12 b without noticing very much and that would more than secure any single black spell you wanted to play (and possibly expensive double black spells). Why bother?
Because the deck needs to shore up 2 matchups primarily: Esper and Mono Black.
The way to do that is not lose what GR teaches us. You need very little to almost get there. And we have room since these matchups playing a bunch of Ghor Clans is a bit awkward anyway. GR isn't quite good enough but it doesn't mean turn your sideboard into all Ultimate Prices and Abrupt Decays.
Let's look at black first. The way to do this stop playing cards over 3cmc that get taken by Lifebane (that can't atleast interact profitably). The best way to do that, play impactful planeswalkers and Rakdos creatures. They can't all be planeswalkers because without the ability to defend they get weaker and Domri gets worse. The first go to is Sire of Insanity but it's a 6 drop, really we need to look along the 4-5 curve first to see if there are better options. There is Chandra and Xenagos, which have varying success here. Honestly this alone I think pushes people into playing Reaper. I know some people don't like it, and I don't think it's a great card but I have such a hard time picture not playing it given the metagame. I side it out often when it feels slow, but it is the best 4 drop in that role. Other cards I recommend people try are Exava. I know different deck etc, but First Strike 4/x is very nicely positioned, it gives you the timing to race Pack Rat and it kills chumping Grey Merchants. It doesn't get through Demon but you need other tools for most of the deck to get through Demon anyway. At 5 Vraska just seems a no brainer. Other interesting cards especially if you opt for 12 black is Herald of Torment.. At 5 mana 12 is sufficient for double black (keep in mind that is half your lands produce black). I'm not suggesting playing a bunch but flying over can make a big difference and it also lets you get a flier bigger than Demon if needed. Sire is good but black with Connections or Pack Rat can play off an empty hand pretty well. I actually think Garruk Caller of the Beasts is just the most powerful effect against that deck. Where Sire punishes control more Garruk is so brutal for decks trying to one for one. I've won games almost single handedly off Garruk where they've burned through all their removal and go for the Demon, I play Garruk with just a dork in play and manage to just draw out of it since the demons could never attack with endless stream of cheap mana dorks to sac.
Against Control you need similar but slightly different tact. I mean Thoughtseize is good but they are less likely to face off with you on the board so early aggression pays off more. Courser of Kruphix and most of our mana dorks are a bit of a liability in terms of just being cards that get swept up without being capable of delivering much damage. Not that we can get rid of all the dorks for curve concerns. The problem is with boarding in so many expensive spells a lot of lists have a hard time cutting any number of dorks. Again having a couple choice on curve replacements makes a lot more sense. You see GR talk about Mistcutter but Mistcutter can't attack through Elspeth Tokens anyway and even though it can't be countered there are plenty of answers, and until x=4 it's pretty small. It's the haste that matters. Against Exava is very good here, as a board option as it has a better rate on curve. It's worse against Blood Baron. Vraska, great again, Sire or Garruk also very good. But the problem is not having a swap for Courser and Scavenging Ooze. Say Ooze becomes some number of Golgari Charm, you still need a hard hitting 3 even more so than 4. In so I can see arguments for Witchstalker (I know I've been critical of it but that's because it is much better role player than all around card). Personally I think Dreg Mangler if supportable is about the best option.
I'd definitely look at designing your board in this way. Looking at threats instead of answers primarily. We just need to make them general. Still cards that are quick and lower curve are also good against decks we need to race or decks that bodies in front make a difference. Like Witchstalker and Dreg Mangler are both good against Burn. Most threats good against Mono Black are also upgrades against control.
The biggest conflict is a lot of what I'm suggesting to make slots for suggests that maxing out Ghor Clan or running Flesh/Blood isn't an option. Given the state of things I think it's a must. But that's the oomph factor this deck provides, even if it isn't the best here and is a bit inconsistent (this is why I largely think Jund, and Monsters in general has been going out of flavour). Without this element the deck has a huge potential to just do nothing in the mirror. This line always leads to other go big spells like Rados's Return and Sire of Insanity but neither is particularly good and maintaining momentum. I'm not sure the current card pool has it. But unless the lists adapt atleast to the top decks right now, I'm not sure when the metagame natural comes back around to accomodate. The GR exodus hasn't translated to top 8's. Maybe there is still something here.
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
4 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Courser of Kruphix
3 Ghor-Clan Rampager
3 Polukranos, World Eater
2 Reaper of the Wilds
4 Stormbreath Dragon
2 Dreadbore
2 Rakdos's Return
2 Xenagos, the Reveler
1 Vraska the Unseen
5 Forest
2 Mountain
4 Stomping Ground
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Blood Crypt
3 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Malice
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Primeval Bounty
1 Chandra, Pyromaster
3 Thoughtseize
2 Golgari Charm
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Putrefy
3 Mizzium Mortars
I lost 3 rounds - round 1 to a monoblack pilot (accomplished regional player) who went on to win the event and then back-to-back win-and-in matches at the end of the day to Gruul Blitz (similar to Ross's list - very explosive - I took 18 damage on turn 4 game 1!) and Junk Midrange (similar to Reid Duke's list piloted by a player who has won a Classic and made finals of an Open). Each of these opponents made top 8 - so I guess I have that going for the performance at least ... I was probably also a little too relaxed after having done really well and feeling like 'luck' was on my side last weekend.
Reaper of the Wilds was nothing special but probably the diversity of threats is better than a fourth Ghor-Clan Rampager and third Xenagos, the Reveler in most games - as I've said, I thought I should try it with only two copies again as it's theoretically pretty good against a lot of the smaller aggro decks and can block Lifebane Zombie if it makes it into play.
I tried the fourth Courser of Kruphix since the life gain and four toughness was so good against all of the small aggro decks two weekends ago - played against midrange and control all day except getting blown out by Rg blitz.
See ryansolid's post (Though I will say, I found the singleton Swamp to be bad at times even when it was largely there as a Borderland Ranger target during a previous standard season) to see why I'm down to a 3/2 split on scry-lands to get extra basic lands in the deck - the manabase becomes more interesting with spoiled cards, but the format could change enough that the deck is largely irrelevant by then.
I've strongly considered flip-flopping to full-on Jund Midrange (board control) main and additional aggressive cards and Domri Rade in the sideboard. We're still the beatdown against the two top decks - UWx control and Bx control; but we need the removal against most of the rest of the metagame. However, I'm still an aggressive midrange player at heart so probably not ...
Other changes for you all to consider for any events you all might have coming up, I really do think I want a third Putrefy in the deck - maybe the third copy of Thoughtseize or Mizzium Mortars is unnecessary - perhaps ryansolid is right that the sideboard needs more threats and less answers. I still haven't gotten the Primeval Bounty into play (eats a lot of opposing Thoughtseizes), but I think I still like it better than Sire of Insanity (since I have Rakdos's Return main) and willing to keep trying it over Garruk, Caller of Beasts for a little while longer. I'm probably finished with standard for a while (SCG spring states?) - I'll keep trying to keep this curated as necessary but do not plan on playing in any more bigger events for several weeks as I tend to family and other real-life obligations. There are three SCG Opens (Cincy, Knoxville, Indy) within driving distance over the next month or so, but I don't think I'm going to be able to make it to any of them.
14 T1 Green Sources, around 17 G altogether
Atleast 14 Red Sources
The black is more interesting depending on need. Single black 4 drop we want about 12. Single Black 3 drop postboard 13. Double Black 4 drop we want maybe as high as 16 (14 is fine, realistically but we are being ideal). 16 Black would be Downfall, but I think there is very little need for that. Double Cost at 5 12 would be fine but if you want to really depend on it let's say as high as 14. So let's say idealized 14 Black Sources and we go from there.
The most obvious thing would be to jam 4 Mana Confluence but that is almost too easy. I mean if you want to play Mutavault that seems reasonable, but I think Mana Confluence actually reduces the need for it. Maybe as a one of but honestly I'd just rather curve. I mean if you are curving that tight why bother putting any mana into the vault until very late game and at that point what is the point.
I mean this gives you 16 Green, 16 T1, 15 Red and 14 Black. We really aren't taking a ton of pain here anyway and we aren't any worse to Burning Earth (we are playing just as many basics). What Confluence does more than anything is make the 3rd color playable as more than a light splash. It barely affects 2 color base 2 color decks. It gives an extra fixer if they want to adjust their Temple numbers, but at that point the 3rd color really does come for very little (maybe even the 4th color).
4 Stomping Ground
4 Blood Crypt
3 Mana Confluence
5 Forest
1 Mountain
3 Temple of Malice
Trading any card in there for the 4th confluence might just be right anyway. Like trade a forest and you get an extra red and black sourrce, trade a mountain and you get an extra black and green source. You could play more Temple's but why?
The biggest difference by far is that on T2 after a Mystic there is almost no question if you can slam the Domri. Having only 3 Temple's mean the likelihood of being forced to play taplands early when you don't want to is much lessened. This actually has a fairly profound effect similarly after Caryatid. I started jamming lists with the above mana base and while it felt like a pure upgrade it made question if I could do more with the curve since it was so much less constrained. One option might simply be go to 23 lands. This is actually fairly reasonable with this mana base. A lot of GR lists did it before but we couldn't really for fixing reasons. I mean cut that mountain (adjust a temple around etc) and what do you really lose? Another option is to play more 5 drops. Mystic Carytid draws are way more likely to happen now without hitting a tapland (ie tightly curving to 5 mana on T3). Mind you finding a 5 that is as good on it's own is a bit of a challenge I think. Stuff like Herald or Xenagod don't play to these jump ahead approaches nearly as well as say a Stormbreath Dragon. And the tricky part is ideally this card would not be able to be hit by Lifebane Zombie (ie.. it's red or black).
The profound impact of this is not only being able to play more 5's but that it encourages playing more 3's + 2 drop removal. Since 1-3 is better you want more impactful 3's. If anything this takes a lot of pressure off the 4 mana slot. However, if this is the game plan that causes a huge fundamental shift. Like Mono Black and Control is a lot less awkward if you are pushing 3 drops (instead of 4's) which means less of a reliance perhaps on expensive 6 mana effects. Either way it's hard to fully grasp the implications. But while I'm not sure this set gives us a bunch of new cards once you adjust the mana you may find it actually changes everything.
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EDIT: After more testing, I'm not even sure if we want any Temples if we go the other way I'm talking about. Think about how much more potent Courser gets when you untap if you know the land off the top is untapped. That if you go, T1 Elf, T2 Domri, T3 Courser, T4 you are almost guarenteed to hit your 5th source untapped. Or even.. T2 Caryatid, T3 Courser, T4 Domri + Dreadbore.. The odds are so much better if you untap on T4 and don't have your 4th land, but see a creature on top of your deck, that drawing with Domri means playing Dreadbore that turn as well. That sequence is like drawing 2 cards, and playing 2 high impact spells on T4. The odds of curving out like that before with Temples was hard. The chances with even 5 temples of being able to use all your mana 3 turns in a row in the early turns is very much hampered (mind you T3 Courser off Caryatid is still a place to play a tapland).
Basically Elvish Mystic just got way better. How about a line reminiscent of last years Jund Deck. Like T1 Mystic, T2 Dreg Manger, T3 Exava.. T4 Courser.. Land off the top hold up Ghor Clan Rampager. One Temple doesn't make that sequence possible. On the play that line is deadly. There aren't any decks ramping into Desecration Demon as of yet really (although that may change). So being able to get in for 10 before the opponent gets to do much of anything. Like let's say T1 they play a tapland.. T2 they play a shock and Caryatid (now they are 15).. They untap T3 at 8 if they didn't block. They drop a Polukranos. You hit them for 7 killing their Polukranos.. There is no coming back. I mean even Dragon off the top and knock them to 4. It's not like they can attack. Being unable to go 1, 3, 4, 5 with the right hand is the reason this deck has never had a goldfish and leads to the awkwardness of wanting those big spells. I'm not saying it happens all the time, but as long as it is available enough even.. 2, 4, 5, 6 or 2, 4, 5, 3/3.. etc.. it makes a huge difference. Some hands just say go for it, and any little slip up (like a tapped land) can make that impractical.
So let's consider this mana base with zero Temples as another extreme.
4 Stomping Ground
4 Blood Crypt
4 Mana Confluence
4 Forest
2 Mountain
2 Swamp
That's still 16 G, 14 R, 14 B. I'm not saying you need all that black. But it's sufficient Black to say play Dreg Mangler and Domri Rade in the same deck if you so wished. Even close to sufficient Red Black to play Spike Jester (I think, I'd want 15 of each). There are some people looking into more hyper aggro decks like that but I think it's still bit poor since it only takes Golgari Charm and some Abrupt Decays to send those decks back to nothing. I think you have to be a bit bigger (not much but a bit). If it ever got really bad there is Anger.
I'm not sure what to do exactly with this knowledge but this takes care of half of the awkwardness I was talking about in Monsters. It was NEVER the fixing it was the curving. Of course we can't find another one drop accelerator to save our life. That would take care of the rest of it. I mean seriously is Wizards just making fun of us.. how many 2 mana creatures that produce 1 mana have they printed in the past year (there is even another one in the new set)? 7? How many see play? It takes something as good as Sylvan Caryatid for it generally to be worth it especially as the formats get stronger. I almost would play a 0/1 illusion dork without flying that produced colorless mana that shocked yourself for 1 every time you tapped for mana at this point. I guess it's just pretty obvious that something like Birds of Paradise would just ruin the format they are trying to build.
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UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
The idea is to play basically the same 75 cards but update maindeck/sideboard placements to start game 1 closer to what my deck was looking like after sideboarding in match-ups where I'm clearly not the beatdown as there seemed to be more and more games where I was wanting all the removal. I was not necessarily looking to go full-on Matt Costa or Tom Ross Jund from early in the season. With extremely limited testing, here's where I currently am:
4 Sylvan Caryatid
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Courser of Kruphix
3 Polukranos, World Eater
2 Stormbreath Dragon
2 Rakdos Keyrune
1 Underworld Connections
1 Primeval Bounty
2 Domri Rade
2 Vraska the Unseen
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Putrefy
3 Thoughtseize
2 Rakdos's Return
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Blood Crypt
4 Forest
1 Mountain
1 Swamp
3 Temple of Abandon
3 Temple of Malice
2 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Underworld Connections
1 Domri Rade
2 Xenagos, the Reveler
2 Dreadbore
2 Mizzium Mortars
I was also considering going to an even lighter on red version that would change the following cards:
OUT Main: -2 Domri Rade, -1 Elvish Mystic, -2 Putrefy, -1 Temple of Abandon
IN Main: +1 Thoughtseize, +1 Abrupt Decay, +2 Hero's Downfall, +2 Forest (or +1 Forest, +1 Swamp?)
OUT SB: -2 Dreadbore, -1 Ghor-Clan Rampager, -1 Stormbreath Dragon, -1 Underworld Connections
IN SB: +2 Putrefy, +1 Domri Rade, +1 Temple of Abandon, +1 Scavenging Ooze
or maybe something in between ... I did like having the ability to still play Domri game 1 despite being creature light in theory - perhaps the Underworld Connections should be Read the Bones (pair in the main) to settle several questions. Also, I really tried to find room for a singleton Whip of Erebos somewhere in there as I've seen it as a one-of in Jund Monsters lists and like the idea of also using 'team gains lifelink' to help offset life-loss even more than ScOoze and Courser already should ...
The only other card completely new to the 75 is Rakdos Keyrune. Rakdos Keyrune fits the older 1-3-5 ramp plan, can play the animate to attack/block role perhaps even better than Mutavault, and can essentially convert green mana to red or black. Turn 1 Elvish Mystic into Turn 2 Rakdos Keyrune + Thoughtseize seems like a fairly slick opening. The keyrune wasn't much of a consideration in the Monsters version where you rarely had the open mana to animate and attack in the early game, but here it can help you get to 4-5 mana and/or block.
The package in the sideboard (Ghor-Clan Rampager, Stormbreath Dragon, Domri Rade, Xenagos, the Reveler) lets you still morph into more of a traditional Jund Monsters deck in games 2 and 3 where you really want to be as aggressive as possible.
Full disclosure: There's a Versus Video going up on SCG tomorrow that includes CVM piloting some sort of Jund Midrange deck (a more traditional build).
EDIT: Forgot to mention how hard I've been working to try to balance the manabase won't matter once we have Temple of Malady and Mana Confluence.
Mind you as you say this may not matter much at all very soon. The effects of Mana Confluence run a lot deeper than fixing. It drastically changes how you want to build your curve, and when you take that into consideration with other decks, I think it's more likely than not cards like Rakdos' Return get a lot worse as while they can be cast a bit earlier for bigger, the time criticalness becomes even more of a thing since it's much easier for them to miss their relevant window. There will likely be very aggressive decks that don't care about their own life total and be able to easily fight through a Courser of Kruphix/Sylvan Caryatid (not as likely til now since early powerful threats were locked by splits costs and awkwardness on curves). This means the generally slow build up and one for one til you find something good won't be as good I believe. Reaper of the Wilds gets worse, Polukranos gets a bit worse. Sylvan Caryatid gets a bit worse. I'm interested to see where that leads.
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The other option is go a bit ambitious with curve but the payout is still variable. Not having scry ends up hurting more in the long run. I realised that when trying Reaper again as I cut him from all early sketches because I anticipate him being much worse. I couldn't believe how much I appreciated the scry. Not to say Reaper is good. Just we need certain elements of card selection to keep the density up since the top end itself has limited shelf life.
In general with Domri getting worse again I wonder if the result is a fundamental change of focus. Still taking a standard build and ignoring this while I think 5 temples are too many I think 2-3 might be necessary.
EDIT I realize that Borderland Ranger comment might sound weird. I mean Courser is a better card right? It just like everything else in this format isn't immediate(unless it's behind curve). This lack of immediacy is a large reason for why things don't quite mesh for us. Generally I'd rather have Courser probably, but at this point I'd probably take anything guaranteed to do something relevant on ETB.
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage
4 Sylvan Caryatid
3 Scavenging Ooze
3 Courser of Kruphix
4 Ghor-Clan Rampager
4 Polukranos, World Eater
4 Stormbreath Dragon
4 Domri Rade
3 Xenagos, the Reveler
2 Mizzium Mortars
4 Forest
4 Stomping Ground
4 Overgrown Tomb
3 Blood Crypt
4 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Malice
2 Mutavault
4 Mistcutter Hydra
1 Vraska the Unseen
1 Mizzium Mortars
1 Doom Blade
2 Putrefy
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Golgari Charm
2 Rakdos's Return
... not even a Temple of Malady
Truthfully, I think Jund Monsters is particularly good week 1 and week 2, just because it has a good anti aggro game while be being good against the midrange decks when they focus on killing little dudes. If you remember the first 3 weeks after BNG this was the case. Once control and bigger midrange finds the right balance it's harder. I think things will be a bit different this time around because I think there are enough tools for GW decks to actually occupy some of the same space as us (more specifically Junk) which takes off some of the heat. At that point our make up might change a little (as I think Junk and bigger GW decks in general are a bit of a weakness as I was lamenting about 3-4 weeks post BNG, before they disapeared last time), but I think the stock list will be good for atleast another week or so (as I hinted towards at the end of my last post).
I'm honestly a little surprised they didn't want a couple Mana Confluence. I don't think Jund Monsters wants 4 or even 3. But 2 seems about right. One of those lands will do about 4 damage to you during the course of a game which is like playing a couple extra shocklands to be sure. But curving tightly can make such a big difference. Mind you I think it doesn't play nice with Mutavault, so I can see the argument for not playing it if Mutavault feels super important. That might be the difference. But I mean BDD's ability to T2 Domri off Elf is pretty bad (worse than most). He has to have one of 7 lands.. That number should be more like 12.. But maybe Domri's awkwardness is just a strike against Domri. In short I think his mana is pretty bad and it isn't a direction we can keep going. Kibler went 6 scrylands right before he gave up on the deck. You need it for the fixing but it's awkward as hell. We finally have a chance to fix our mana but we get this.
I think what we witnessed was a good player, playing a well positioned deck, with a fairly tried and true list. However, I think as the format shakes out this manabase will not be acceptable. I know it's been fine, but there is a real risk to get overrun by decks that just curve better once they shake out.
EDIT:
My current list
4 Stomping Ground
4 Blood Crypt
4 Overgrown Tomb
1 Steam Vents (Mountain)
1 Temple of Abandon
1 Temple of Malady
2 Temple of Malice
2 Mana Confluence
4 Forest
1 Mutavault
Creatures(27):
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Sylvan Caryatid
3 Scavenging Ooze
4 Courser of Kruphix
3 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Ghor Clan Rampager
2 Reaper of the Wilds
4 Stormbreath Dragon
3 Domri Rade
1 Vraska, the Unseen
1 Garruk, Caller of the Beasts
Other(4):
2 Mizzium Mortars
2 Dreadbore
2 Thougthseize
2 Cyclonic Rift (Doom Blade/Ultimate Price)
1 Mizzium Mortars
2 Golgari Charm
3 Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch
1 Vraska, the Unseen
4 Mistcutter Hydra
That's 16 G, 14 R, 13 B. So far my favorite part of this list is that it only goes down to 25 Creatures against control. This means that there is no consistency issues with Domri or Garruk. It's possible I want one more Golgari Charm/Abrupt Decay or one of those Exava or Mistcutter's becomes a Xenagos since my postboard plan against control is particularly bad to Blind Obediance. Mind you this is all built off the premise that you don't want to over sideboard black removal against black decks. I am largely missing Putrefies. I think there is this awkwardness where they just strip your hand of removal depending on your draw. My hope is to present a board fast enough that they have a hard time keeping up and that their Lifebane largely misses over 4 mana. As for Doom Blade/Ultimate Price pretend those Cyclonic Rifts in the board are those and I think we'll be on the same page of how I board these days.
EDIT 2: After seeing Cannon's List and wanting to try 23 lands I'm thinking this. Confluence looks a touch more appealing with a lower land count.
4 Stomping Ground
4 Blood Crypt
4 Overgrown Tomb
1 Temple of Abandon
1 Temple of Malice
3 Mana Confluence
4 Forest
2 Mutavault
Creatures(25):
4 Elvish Mystic
4 Sylvan Caryatid
3 Scavenging Ooze
2 Courser of Kruphix
2 Polukranos, World Eater
4 Ghor Clan Rampager
2 Reaper of the Wilds
4 Stormbreath Dragon
4 Domri Rade
2 Xenagos, the Reveler
1 Vraska, the Unseen
Other(5):
1 Mizzium Mortars
2 Dreadbore
2 Cyclonic Rift (Abrupt Decay)
2 Thougthseize
2 Mizzium Mortars
3 Golgari Charm
1 Courser of Kruphix
3 Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch
1 Vraska, the Unseen
3 Mistcutter Hydra
GWU Knightfall Modern
UW Tempo Legacy
UGR Burning Wish Cobra Vintage