ive been playing the deck online and it most certainly has legs... its very good against other creature decks, the big decks can sometimes be too slow, and even in an attrition matchups it has enough recursion to keep the pedal to the metal. the ground tends to get gummed up in standard, and bone picker is a serious player, turn 1 dread wanderer, turn 2 ballista for 0 play 2 bone pickers is one of my favorite openings. in the sideboard I have ob nixilis, khalitas and mindwrack demons to go over the removal that they are certainly bringing in for game 2
bob is great out of the board in the spot of vistor and deaths shadow. I am not a fan of bob main, because all of their main deck creature removal becomes live, and since we dont have any other creatures, there is a pretty good chance he is going to take one to the face.
If u are running bridges main, i would suggest that you swap out all your artifacts (racks and bridges) and bring in another threat (bob/vistor/rat) and targeted removal. most likely they will side out some number of creature removal for artifact removal and then you will be sitting pretty
First of all, what do you think about mainin 3 Colective Brutallity? Here the meta have a lot of Burns and Zoo decks, so im very happy about them, but 3? its too much? what do you think about this card in particular?
Second, a friend of mine told me to side the Asylum Visitor, but the card feel a little clumsy, and i do not know in witch matchs side her; i prefer Pack Rat thinking about the Ley Line and Trons.
Every advice you give me will be very much appreciated
I feel collective brutality can be good if you are getting value out of the cards you are discarding (lingering souls, bloodghast, etc). it is very good against burn and zoo, so if you are playing against them a lot i can see the include in the main.
asylum vistor comes in against aggressive decks in place of thoughtseize, it can trade early for a body or start to gain card advantage as the game goes on. the real dream is turn 4 smallpox and cast it off madness, thats a beating. it also comes in against the control decks, giving you another threat and a way to gain card advantage. Pack rat is another great option, which I have tried before, but I am liking the 2/2 split of deaths shadow/vistor I have now.
I made top 8 of a GP trial for vegas the other day, lost to UW control in top 8 (good friend of mine who went on to win it). also lost to UW control in the swiss. ancestral visions is really bad for us, I am thinking of how I want to combat it. best choice seems to be wasteland strangler, but a chalice on 0 can stop it as well. in top 8 i chose to be on the play with the hopes to IOK/surgical visions, but his opener didnt have it
its for the aggressive/burn decks. it gets very large very quick, block anything that they are playing, and can close the game out in a swing or 2 because those matchups are all about racing. builds with funeral charm can have a 10/10 swampwalker with an urborg out out of nowhere
I find leyline of sanctity is a bit of a trap against us. I love playing against Ad Naus, Boggles, and new cheerios and watching them mull for leyline of sanctity. I honestly cant remember the last time I lost to a leyline of sanctity on board and Ive played at least 3 games in the last 2 weeks with it out as new cheerios and bogles is always at my local.
I expect to see a resurgence of infect any day now, how do you all find that match up? I would think inkmoth would be the big player here on infects side.
Nukedz how do you even rate dismember as it "cost" you games? I am not sure how you can even make that statement with any validity is it just a feeling? I understand you pay life for dismember but did you pay the life and not kill the creature? For example if you dismember a goblin guide t1 and pay 4 life you you saved that 4 life that the guide would do the next two turns therefore costing you no life. Against death's shadow zoo I haven't a clue how you could possibly say dismember cost you the game, there creatures get huge fast a 4 life investment to kill one of their creatures is cheap. I may just be totally missing a scenario that it does cost you games could you please elaborate?
the infect matchup is all about controlling inkmoth. most 8 rack lists are running more removal in the 75 than infect has infect creatures. if you dont run GQ the matchup becomes much more difficult. post board you can pull some discard spells to bring in extra creature removal.
What i think he meant as far as dismember cost him the game is that deaths shadows creatures get out of dismember range very quickly, but they all die to push.
I think 8 rack lines up very nicely against deaths shadow. they are trying to grind us out and win on the back of one creature. make sure u bring in surgicals/grave hate game 2, part of their plan is recurring the goyfs and shadows. any card that allows a 2 for 1 is bad for us, and k command is at the top of the list. surgical one of their threats and they become much more tame.
eldrazi tron is a tough matchup, we are conceeding the draw, so a turn 1 chalice is very tough to beat through. smallpox is at its best in this matchup, and dismember gets around chalice and hits just about all of their threats. if you can hit them early and land a liliana, you can begin to take over the game. decks that invest a lot into a land (eldrazi temple) or into tempo (simian spirit guide) really get punished by smallpox.
I still think it is correct to always be on the draw. I asked Tom Ross about any matchups where this might not be correct, but we are both in agreement that it is always correct to be on the draw.
as far as splash colors/lingering souls.... tbh I am not a fan. I think what makes this deck good is it does not need to mulligan very often, it has a very stable mana base, and its quite linear as far as how games play out. trying to get cute with other colors and make terrible matchups better, I think overall make the deck weaker. I know I hurt my mana base a little bit playing 4 ghost quarters, but I believe that I am shoring up a very huge weakness of this deck by doing so. To add another color means to not run ghost quarters, which i feel is incorrect. I dont want to be casting lingering souls for 2 1/1 spirits, i want to be making my opp discard to get them under the 2 racks I have in play.
I hear leyline of sanctity is autowin against us. think again.
Glad to see 8 rack not only going deep in all the major tournaments so far this year, but that each build is different in its own way. the indy build does seem to be somewhat budget oriented, I can't ever imagine NOT sleeving up 4 lilianas. The augur of skulls seems interesting, kind of like wrench mind 5-6, and any type of two for 1 is welcome in this deck.
What strikes me as odd is his only maindeck removal are 2 lilly and 4 funeral charms, with only 2 bridges?? I run way more removal main and side, and I still get steamrolled from time to time, I am curious if he just hit a bridge every game and no one had an answer for it? maybe the augur did work on defense. way too many x/2 creatures in this format to run 4 funeral charms main. esp since deaths shadow decks were going to be there in full force, would have went 4 push over 4 funeral charms main.
love pack rat out of the board, it gives the deck a whole different dynamic with just a few deck slots. decks that side out their creature removal or dont bring in mass removal are in for quite the surprise when the rat hits the table. my one knock on it is that there are so many efficient removal spells and every deck packs them. basically you put them on the spot, have an answer now or lose to an army of rats.
Best matchups? anything fair for the most part, decks that want to exchange cards 1 for 1 like jund. anything that wants to run on minimal resources (deaths shadow/ur prowess/infect/boggles). they are trying to invest in one creature, and if you are able to control their creatures they are stuck with a bunch of pump spells that do nothing. personally, I think RG valakut is a very good matchup. U/x control is very good too, anything that wants to sit there with cards in hand is going to be a good matchup.
things that are bad for us - Tron. If you don't run ghost quarters main, it can be a real nightmare. Even with them it's no picnic. At regionals I got lucky game 1 drawing into 3 ghost quarters to keep him off tron, and game 2 I won because he forgot to bring back endbringer, otherwise I was dead. if tron is a big player in the meta, I would def move away from 8rack, we are both long game decks and their long game is so much better than ours.
anything that generates additional effects from its cards (company, U/W/x flash, abzan) or has cards that generate multiple cards from its cards (W/x tokens,lingering souls decks) is going to be tough for us. affinity can be tough game 1, but game 2 gets a little better, its by no means unwinnable, but it is very draw dependant. it might not seem it, but smallpox is very important in that matchup, you are hoping they stumble a bit and you can really strain them. against fast decks like affinity and burn, rack effects are at a premium. they naturally want to vomit their hand, and for the most part the way you are going to win is to just outrace them.
I think 8 rack rewards knowing matchups more than a lot of modern decks. Knowing what to take with targeted discard, knowing what hands to keep vs certain decks, knowing when to turtle up and when to race.
Perplex11, I think that is a fine starting point for the deck. Remember you are always on the draw when it is your choice. don't be afraid to take out all 4 racks and side in other threats (vistor/nxyathid/pack rat/bob) if you suspect they are bringing in artifact hate. You can side out a land in the slower matchups if you know that you are going to be on the draw. Everyone has their own opinion on ghost quarter, I am a huge fan of it in this deck, but that is up to you. I am a fan of the mono black version, but thats me.
6 graveyard hate cards in the board seems a little much, especially with dredge being on the decline. running leylines and surgicals seems like a good idea, but it kinda sucks when they run into each other (IE, you have a leyline in play and you draw surgical). if you are playing leylines, run 4 in the board and let that be your grave hate. You are going to mull for it anyway, thats why you run them. If the decks that leyline hoses are there in great numbers (dredge/living end/dredgevine) you probally dont want to be playing 8 rack. It is very good against Grixis though. I perfer the surgical take because in your really bad matchups you have a lot of dead cards, and surgical can actually swing the tide of the game (extracting a tron land, ad nauseum).
If I were to run my list from regionals in a tournament now, I would take out 1 rack effect for one infernal tutor. Racks are generally bad early in the game, and once you hit 3 mana, you can tutor for a rack n play it, or you can get ravens crime when you need it, or if you flood out you can get lilly and play her. i havent tested it, but it seems like a very low opportunity cost for a very big upside.
I am not a fan of collective brutality in this deck, if you have ways to gain advantage from the discard (lingering souls, vistor, bloodghast, etc) then I think it can be okay, but just pitching cards to escalate doesnt seem to be what we want.
call to the netherworld, in a deck that doesn't really run creatures, doesn't seem good. The last thing you want in a topdeck war is a card that does nothing on its own.
First rule of playing this deck is.... dont miss rack triggers! Glad to see he took it the distance at a big event, if I had to splash I think i would go green, abrupt decay is amazing and life from the loam/ravens crime is very interesting to say the least.
Tendrils is great out of the board. the creatures that can really give you fits are ones that replace themselves (finks, voice) and being able to clear the board without them coming back is huge.
the reason bridge is good is because you can cast it off the top and it stays on the battle field. cards like tendrils, when you are ahead on board, upticking lilly, you just toss to the yard. bridge gives you something that stays in play while you are ahead. I dont like builds that rely too heavily on bridge. with the amount of removal I have in the 75, i can manage the board and the bridge can really be punishing, which it certainly was at regionals. I wouldnt go up to 4 of either tendrills or bridges, but I think 2/2 is perfect.
gifted aetherborn might be good for heavy aggro decks, but i dont want a card that is going to trade 1 for 1 against something that wants to go wide. id rather something like tendrils or bridge. if you are going to run scepter, i would just run necrogen mists you dont want to play out more than 3 lands, you want to hold the rest for ravens crime, so having to spend 2 mana a turn is a lot.
everyone says the 4 ghost quarters are too much, but i really feel like you need them. I will usually keep a 1 swamp hand as long as the rest of the cards arent wrench mind/lilly/smallpox. being on the draw helps, and if you draw an urborg, it immediately fixes all of your mana. yes, i have had my urborg ghost quartered, and u know what you get? a swamp. i think if you run 4 ghost quarters, then 4 dismember/2 push main is correct, being able to cast dismember off a gq or mutavault comes up quite a bit. someone mentioned fulminators, but 1- on the draw against tron they can nut draw you before you even cast fulminator 2-I dont have 4 sideboard slots for a 10/90 matchup. so many decks have a land that you need to be able to interact with, going in game 1 without a way to destroy a land seems really bad. grixis has tarpit, merfolk mutavaults (remember that their lords of atlantis pump YOUR mutavault) company has township, infect has nexus, jund Ravine, even against skred red, i was happy to have ghost quarter to get rid of scrying sheets beccause he was getting above the rack/affliction. in a deck that wants to go hellbent so quickly and play on an empty board, I think you really need to get the most out of your manabase. the 16/4/4 is really conservative, ive played this deck for a long time, I am all about the 4 ghost quarters, everyone has their own opinion, but I am keeping mine in.
I have used this mana base for a long time, i feel the ghost quarters have filled out one of the decks weakness without severely hurting our manabase. I think there was one mulligan I took where I didnt have a black source but a ghost quarter in the opening hand. maybe you can go down to 3 or even 2, but i feel 0 is the wrong number. I like having 4
as far as funeral charm, i think charms power is related to how consistently you use it as a removal spell, otherwise it is just an instant speed ravens crime. there are a lot of x/2 creatures in the format, and the decks where funeral charm is good as a removal spell (infect, affinty), fatal push is just as good. i originally had charms in, but took them out to free up the two slots in the board for the bridges. infect also took a hit with the banning of probe, so I didnt expect to see it as much.
leyline is very good against the decks it hoses. the problem is you have to have it in your opener, and it leads you to mulliganing good hands and keeping bad hands because of it. two teir one decks are weak to leyline, grixis and dredge. I think grixis is a good matchup, and dredge certainly is not. surgical however, can steal games against tron and is good against the combo decks of the format. i felt that surgicals gave me more game against more of the field, and I didnt want to use a card that made an already good matchup better.
fatal push is great, not sure if the 4 dismember/2 pushes main is correct, but it hits everything you want it to hit. fatal pushes were dead in half my matchups because half of my matches were against RG Valakut, lol.
@lioncourt I will be honest, I have not tested collective brutality. It seems like it is amazing against burn, but this deck is hellbent so much i cant see you casting it for more than one mode after turn 4. I dont think I want it over wrench mind in the main. Also, two mana is a lot in this deck, the two cards we have now, wrench mind and smallpox provide us card advantage, while CB does not. I will try it out though.
I like the idea of Bob out of the board. There are certainly instances you want to side out all 4 racks and bring in a high impact creature. Pack rat is also amazing in that slot, but I can get down with bob. I really like vistor because its a fairly quick clock and provides card advantage. the complete blowout is when u cast smallpox and cast it off madness, thats a real backbreaker
everyone says this. ive been running 4 gq 4 mutavault main and i feel its correct.
If u are running bridges main, i would suggest that you swap out all your artifacts (racks and bridges) and bring in another threat (bob/vistor/rat) and targeted removal. most likely they will side out some number of creature removal for artifact removal and then you will be sitting pretty
I feel collective brutality can be good if you are getting value out of the cards you are discarding (lingering souls, bloodghast, etc). it is very good against burn and zoo, so if you are playing against them a lot i can see the include in the main.
asylum vistor comes in against aggressive decks in place of thoughtseize, it can trade early for a body or start to gain card advantage as the game goes on. the real dream is turn 4 smallpox and cast it off madness, thats a beating. it also comes in against the control decks, giving you another threat and a way to gain card advantage. Pack rat is another great option, which I have tried before, but I am liking the 2/2 split of deaths shadow/vistor I have now.
I made top 8 of a GP trial for vegas the other day, lost to UW control in top 8 (good friend of mine who went on to win it). also lost to UW control in the swiss. ancestral visions is really bad for us, I am thinking of how I want to combat it. best choice seems to be wasteland strangler, but a chalice on 0 can stop it as well. in top 8 i chose to be on the play with the hopes to IOK/surgical visions, but his opener didnt have it
the infect matchup is all about controlling inkmoth. most 8 rack lists are running more removal in the 75 than infect has infect creatures. if you dont run GQ the matchup becomes much more difficult. post board you can pull some discard spells to bring in extra creature removal.
What i think he meant as far as dismember cost him the game is that deaths shadows creatures get out of dismember range very quickly, but they all die to push.
eldrazi tron is a tough matchup, we are conceeding the draw, so a turn 1 chalice is very tough to beat through. smallpox is at its best in this matchup, and dismember gets around chalice and hits just about all of their threats. if you can hit them early and land a liliana, you can begin to take over the game. decks that invest a lot into a land (eldrazi temple) or into tempo (simian spirit guide) really get punished by smallpox.
I still think it is correct to always be on the draw. I asked Tom Ross about any matchups where this might not be correct, but we are both in agreement that it is always correct to be on the draw.
as far as splash colors/lingering souls.... tbh I am not a fan. I think what makes this deck good is it does not need to mulligan very often, it has a very stable mana base, and its quite linear as far as how games play out. trying to get cute with other colors and make terrible matchups better, I think overall make the deck weaker. I know I hurt my mana base a little bit playing 4 ghost quarters, but I believe that I am shoring up a very huge weakness of this deck by doing so. To add another color means to not run ghost quarters, which i feel is incorrect. I dont want to be casting lingering souls for 2 1/1 spirits, i want to be making my opp discard to get them under the 2 racks I have in play.
I hear leyline of sanctity is autowin against us. think again.
What strikes me as odd is his only maindeck removal are 2 lilly and 4 funeral charms, with only 2 bridges?? I run way more removal main and side, and I still get steamrolled from time to time, I am curious if he just hit a bridge every game and no one had an answer for it? maybe the augur did work on defense. way too many x/2 creatures in this format to run 4 funeral charms main. esp since deaths shadow decks were going to be there in full force, would have went 4 push over 4 funeral charms main.
things that are bad for us - Tron. If you don't run ghost quarters main, it can be a real nightmare. Even with them it's no picnic. At regionals I got lucky game 1 drawing into 3 ghost quarters to keep him off tron, and game 2 I won because he forgot to bring back endbringer, otherwise I was dead. if tron is a big player in the meta, I would def move away from 8rack, we are both long game decks and their long game is so much better than ours.
anything that generates additional effects from its cards (company, U/W/x flash, abzan) or has cards that generate multiple cards from its cards (W/x tokens,lingering souls decks) is going to be tough for us. affinity can be tough game 1, but game 2 gets a little better, its by no means unwinnable, but it is very draw dependant. it might not seem it, but smallpox is very important in that matchup, you are hoping they stumble a bit and you can really strain them. against fast decks like affinity and burn, rack effects are at a premium. they naturally want to vomit their hand, and for the most part the way you are going to win is to just outrace them.
I think 8 rack rewards knowing matchups more than a lot of modern decks. Knowing what to take with targeted discard, knowing what hands to keep vs certain decks, knowing when to turtle up and when to race.
Perplex11, I think that is a fine starting point for the deck. Remember you are always on the draw when it is your choice. don't be afraid to take out all 4 racks and side in other threats (vistor/nxyathid/pack rat/bob) if you suspect they are bringing in artifact hate. You can side out a land in the slower matchups if you know that you are going to be on the draw. Everyone has their own opinion on ghost quarter, I am a huge fan of it in this deck, but that is up to you. I am a fan of the mono black version, but thats me.
6 graveyard hate cards in the board seems a little much, especially with dredge being on the decline. running leylines and surgicals seems like a good idea, but it kinda sucks when they run into each other (IE, you have a leyline in play and you draw surgical). if you are playing leylines, run 4 in the board and let that be your grave hate. You are going to mull for it anyway, thats why you run them. If the decks that leyline hoses are there in great numbers (dredge/living end/dredgevine) you probally dont want to be playing 8 rack. It is very good against Grixis though. I perfer the surgical take because in your really bad matchups you have a lot of dead cards, and surgical can actually swing the tide of the game (extracting a tron land, ad nauseum).
If I were to run my list from regionals in a tournament now, I would take out 1 rack effect for one infernal tutor. Racks are generally bad early in the game, and once you hit 3 mana, you can tutor for a rack n play it, or you can get ravens crime when you need it, or if you flood out you can get lilly and play her. i havent tested it, but it seems like a very low opportunity cost for a very big upside.
call to the netherworld, in a deck that doesn't really run creatures, doesn't seem good. The last thing you want in a topdeck war is a card that does nothing on its own.
First rule of playing this deck is.... dont miss rack triggers! Glad to see he took it the distance at a big event, if I had to splash I think i would go green, abrupt decay is amazing and life from the loam/ravens crime is very interesting to say the least.
the reason bridge is good is because you can cast it off the top and it stays on the battle field. cards like tendrils, when you are ahead on board, upticking lilly, you just toss to the yard. bridge gives you something that stays in play while you are ahead. I dont like builds that rely too heavily on bridge. with the amount of removal I have in the 75, i can manage the board and the bridge can really be punishing, which it certainly was at regionals. I wouldnt go up to 4 of either tendrills or bridges, but I think 2/2 is perfect.
gifted aetherborn might be good for heavy aggro decks, but i dont want a card that is going to trade 1 for 1 against something that wants to go wide. id rather something like tendrils or bridge. if you are going to run scepter, i would just run necrogen mists you dont want to play out more than 3 lands, you want to hold the rest for ravens crime, so having to spend 2 mana a turn is a lot.
everyone says the 4 ghost quarters are too much, but i really feel like you need them. I will usually keep a 1 swamp hand as long as the rest of the cards arent wrench mind/lilly/smallpox. being on the draw helps, and if you draw an urborg, it immediately fixes all of your mana. yes, i have had my urborg ghost quartered, and u know what you get? a swamp. i think if you run 4 ghost quarters, then 4 dismember/2 push main is correct, being able to cast dismember off a gq or mutavault comes up quite a bit. someone mentioned fulminators, but 1- on the draw against tron they can nut draw you before you even cast fulminator 2-I dont have 4 sideboard slots for a 10/90 matchup. so many decks have a land that you need to be able to interact with, going in game 1 without a way to destroy a land seems really bad. grixis has tarpit, merfolk mutavaults (remember that their lords of atlantis pump YOUR mutavault) company has township, infect has nexus, jund Ravine, even against skred red, i was happy to have ghost quarter to get rid of scrying sheets beccause he was getting above the rack/affliction. in a deck that wants to go hellbent so quickly and play on an empty board, I think you really need to get the most out of your manabase. the 16/4/4 is really conservative, ive played this deck for a long time, I am all about the 4 ghost quarters, everyone has their own opinion, but I am keeping mine in.
I have used this mana base for a long time, i feel the ghost quarters have filled out one of the decks weakness without severely hurting our manabase. I think there was one mulligan I took where I didnt have a black source but a ghost quarter in the opening hand. maybe you can go down to 3 or even 2, but i feel 0 is the wrong number. I like having 4
as far as funeral charm, i think charms power is related to how consistently you use it as a removal spell, otherwise it is just an instant speed ravens crime. there are a lot of x/2 creatures in the format, and the decks where funeral charm is good as a removal spell (infect, affinty), fatal push is just as good. i originally had charms in, but took them out to free up the two slots in the board for the bridges. infect also took a hit with the banning of probe, so I didnt expect to see it as much.
leyline is very good against the decks it hoses. the problem is you have to have it in your opener, and it leads you to mulliganing good hands and keeping bad hands because of it. two teir one decks are weak to leyline, grixis and dredge. I think grixis is a good matchup, and dredge certainly is not. surgical however, can steal games against tron and is good against the combo decks of the format. i felt that surgicals gave me more game against more of the field, and I didnt want to use a card that made an already good matchup better.
fatal push is great, not sure if the 4 dismember/2 pushes main is correct, but it hits everything you want it to hit. fatal pushes were dead in half my matchups because half of my matches were against RG Valakut, lol.
@lioncourt I will be honest, I have not tested collective brutality. It seems like it is amazing against burn, but this deck is hellbent so much i cant see you casting it for more than one mode after turn 4. I dont think I want it over wrench mind in the main. Also, two mana is a lot in this deck, the two cards we have now, wrench mind and smallpox provide us card advantage, while CB does not. I will try it out though.
I like the idea of Bob out of the board. There are certainly instances you want to side out all 4 racks and bring in a high impact creature. Pack rat is also amazing in that slot, but I can get down with bob. I really like vistor because its a fairly quick clock and provides card advantage. the complete blowout is when u cast smallpox and cast it off madness, thats a real backbreaker