@JunkBeezy: great read! Thanks for taking the time. You were able to dodge e-tron and traditional tron, good times! About the match against Titanshift, did you win solely on LoTV? I sometimes feel it isn't enough because a topdeck scapeshift or titan just wins the game on the spot.
Thanks, no problem! I'm glad I can contribute to helping the Abzan community. Sometimes it's not enough to just have Liliana, I also had one piece of hand removal to take I think a Pact out of his hand. Variance may have been on my side since he didn't rip his Prime Times after that. Game 3 I saw more midrange cards like Courser in against me and they just died without helping him much.
Congrats on your sweet finish, just wondering how you found treetop village in your games. Did the faster clock matter? Been wanting to try it over both Shambling vent and Stirring Wildwood. Voice is an interesting choice I'm willing to try in my meta. Great write up too man!
Treetop Village has been awesome! It applies so much quick pressure for only 1G, and it has trample so tiny chump blockers can't stop it. I like it for assassinating planeswalkers like Karn and Lilianas, too. Having a third creature-land also just makes you have less dead draws later in games.
Congrats for your Finish and for Great report!i'd like to ask hier the 3/1 lilly Split works out for you?
Thank you very much! I think it worked out well, if you have a Veil in play and draw a Last Hope, you have the choice to -2 the Veil for value and cast the Last Hope, or just discard the Hope, so it won't be a dead draw. Last Hope is very good against Counters Company and Affinity, she's able to pick off creature after creature for free each turn, and in the mirror she lets your Goyfs always be bigger and can come out, -2 to get a creature, and still absorb a removal spell from your opponent. Her ultimate is also an instant game over against any midrange/control deck, whereas Veil is only sometimes an instant KO, and Veil cannot plus to protect herself. Basically between the two of them I think they cover all your bases nicely.
I only see one match where you don't bring in Kitchen Finks. Maybe it's time to just mainboard that card. I find myself bring it in in more matchups than not as well.
I'm still on the fence about it, since it's basically dead against some decks like Storm and Affinity, and I have very little room to move numbers around it seems like. I don't think I would end up putting more than 1 in the main.
Round 2: RG Titanshift, 2-1
I won games 1 and 3 by playing Liliana of the Veil on turn 3 on the play, which was pretty darn good. He punked me out game 2 with an early Prime Time, as that deck tends to do. The Extraction brought in was mostly for Primeval Titan should I steal it from his hand or kill one, but also possibly for Valakut if he was to pitch it to Liliana. Souls feels too slow against them.
Out: Fatal Push x3, Lingering Souls x2, Nihil Spellbomb
In: Kitchen Finks x2, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2, Surgical Extraction x1
Round 3: Esper Goryo's Vengeance, 2-1
This was the fringey-est deck i played against, and I didn't really know it was a thing until my friend played against it the day before in the Open. Thankfully, I got the idea pretty quickly and knew how I wanted to sideboard. Game 1, we were in topdeck mode and he peeled Elesh Norn on seven mana and crushed me with Creeping Tar Pits while wiping my board. Game 2 I disrupted him pretty heavily with a Surgical Extraction and beat down with Goyfs, and game 3 he kept a LOT of removal in his opener but I curved Liliana, the Last Hope into Gideon, Ally of Zendikar and the game was pretty much over from that point on (ended up with 2 Gideon emblems and a Lili emblem). My creature lands were very good in this matchup as well. I trimmed on Lilianas because I didn't want him discarding value, abrupt decay is pretty bad, but Push still hits tar Pits and baby Jace.
Out: Abrupt Decay x2, Fatal Push x1, Liliana of the Veil x2, Inquisition of Kozilek x1
In: Surgical Extraction x2, Kitchen Finks x2, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2
Round 4: GW Value-Town, 0-2
Oh boy did I get smashed in this one. Thankfully my opponent was nice and we had a lot of fun with it. Game 1 he landed a bunch of dorks and Gavony Township and I really couldn't do much but play creatures that eventually got outsized. If I had drawn a Liliana of some sort it might have ended differently because I had a decent amount of chumpers. Game 2 I was able to land a Gideon with protection, but a sick Collected Company hit was able to snipe him and I fell too far behind from there. Liliana is bad against GW go-wide decks, and I didn't want hand hate that couldn't hit Collected Company. Siege Rhino was the last cut and just seemed like the worst remaining card.
Out: Liliana of the Veil x3, Inquisition of Kozilek x3, Siege Rhino x1
In: Flaying Tendrils, Collective Brutality x1, Kitchen Finks x2, Damnation, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2
Round 5: Abzan, 2-0
This round was interesting. He was running a list that played Knight of the Reliquary, Vault of the Archangel, Gavony Township, and Bitterblossom. Game 1 I just had better draws and rode a Liliana of the Veil and two Dark Confidant triggers to victory. Game 2 my opponent made a mistake that I think cost him the game. He had bitterblossom and 3 faeries out, and cast lingering souls, but used the same token to represent all of the fliers. Next turn, he swung with two of the fliers and I asked if they were spirits, faeries, or what. He seemed to think it didn't matter and attacked with the spirits, which next turn allowed me to Maelstrom Pulse all the faeries away and get in too much damage for him to recover from, as he had left all his mana open hoping to activate Vault on defense. I boarded out the hand hate as usual for the mirror and mirror-esque matches as well as Lilianas which seemed generally bad against a token heavy Abzan list. I bring in the most two-for-one-ish cards I have as well as more removal for bitterblossom and tokens. Brutality was the last card to come in and was just better than the third Liliana.
Out: Inquisition of Kozilek x3, Thoughtseize x3, Liliana of the Veil x3
In: Abrupt Decay, Maelstrom Pulse, Damnation, Flaying Tendrils, Kitchen Finks x2, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2, Collective Brutality x1
Round 6: Death's Shadow, 2-0
This round went really smoothly for me. My removal lined up well against his threats, and drawing 3+ of any combination of Voice of Resurgence, Lingering Souls, and Siege Rhino is basically enough to KO them. Voice was extremely disruptive game 1, and he was forced to Push the Voice main phase and terminate the huge token, then ended up using Pushes and Terminates on single souls tokens before losing to more. Post board I bring in even more annoying cards like Gideon and Finks. I feel pretty favored in this matchup, especially post-board. I feel like I can bring out the hand hate for more resilient threats and less bad topdecks.
Out: Inquisition of Kozilek x3, Thoughtseize x3, Fatal Push x1
In: Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2, Kitchen Finks x2, Blessed Alliance, Damnation, Maelstrom Pulse
Round 7: UR Gifts Storm, 2-1
Game 1 I disrupted him fairly well, but my Bob betrayed me and kept flipping Lingering Souls and Maelstrom Pulse, which left me dead to a non-combo Grapeshot for 7. Nihil Spellbomb and hand hate, along with a 6/7 Tarmogoyf took game 2 for me, and then Game 3 I saw his opener and chose to rip a combo piece out and leave him with Blood Moon, and just play around moon since it did nothing to help him combo. I brought in an extra Pulse in case he was able to cast an Empty the Warrens for a bunch, and took out my six slowest, non-disruptive cards.
Out: Lingering Souls x4, Liliana, the Last Hope, Siege Rhino x1
In: Abrupt Decay, Surgical Extraction x2, Collective Brutality x2, Maelstrom Pulse
Quarterfinals: UW Control 2-0
Game 1 I had the wombo combo of T1 Inquisiton, T2 Bob, T3 Liliana of the Veil; even though the Bob bit the dust to Path, he didn't have a counter for Liliana, and she stripped him of too many cards. Game 2 we both had ridiculous draws for at least seven consecutive turns after Liliana of the Veil brought us into topdeck mode very quickly (Something like Bob for me into D-sphere for him into Abrupt Decay for me into Path for him into Souls for me into Gideon for him into Maelstrom Pulse for me), but fortunately Liliana was still out for that entire time and I rode the ultimate to victory after ripping Souls, Souls, Finks while he hit mostly lands. I took out one Goyf to limit bad draws against an inevitable Rest in Peace, and kept in a few Paths over Pushes because it hits Collonades as well as Gideon if he swings.
Out: Fatal Push x3, Siege Rhino x2, Abrupt Decay x1, Path to Exile x1
In: Collective Brutality x2, Kitchen Finks x2, Maelstrom Pulse, Gideon, Ally of Zendikdar x2
Semifinals: Burn, 1-2
Game 1, he got one too many Goblin Guide hits, and I got land each time, it just didn't matter because of how awkward my lands ended up being that game. I had to shock myself which basically ended up giving him enough gas to kill me before I could stabilize. Game 2 I had the Push for the Guide and the Inquisition for the Eidolon, and turn 3 I had a 5/6 Goyf that clocked him very quickly along with a Shambling Vent and a Voice, which sealed the deal when he was forced to give me an Elemental token by bolting my Shambling Vent. Game 3 my hand was a little risky in that my only life gain was a Kitchen Finks, but it had removal, lands, and disruption so I went with it. It basically came down to whether or not he had the Skullcrack for my Finks and unfortunately, he did.
Out: Thoughtseize x3, Dark Confidant x3, Nihil Spellbomb
In: Kitchen Finks x2, Collective Brutality x2, Blessed Alliance, Abrupt Decay, Flaying Tendrils
Overall I had a great experience, and had a lot of fun playing the deck and talking with my opponents, especially in the top 8 where basically all we did was joke with each other (I also played magic to the best of my ability). I really liked how Voice performed for me. Granted, I didn't play against Eldrazi Tron, but I feel like it's not as bad as it seems against them, since it survives All is Dust, and the Elemental can often tangle with the bigger Eldrazi just fine. In the testing I did against Spaghetti Tron it didn't seem like a liability. I think I would want a Ghost Quarter and one more card against Burn somewhere in the 75, but other than that I feel really good about this list. That does it for the tournament run-down, I'll do my best to answer any questions/suggestions!
First things first, great job man and congrats ending 4th! Oeee, I'll go first :-D! In general I'd like to know your matchups, sideboarding an thoughts. If you feel like writing a tournament wrap-up.
Also, I have a few specific questions regarding your main board setup:
Did you like the 4-2 split in discard spells? In the current meta I think that 3-3 might be better because of the big mana decks?
Is there a specific reason for you to run Nihil Spellbomb MB? You don't run Grim Flayer, but you grow Tarmogoyf and it's good against graveyard decks, I guess.
Thank you! I'll definitely get a tournament report by tomorrow, but for now I'll just answer those bullet points.
Voice of Resurgence was very good for me, against death's shadow and control they need to get rid of it quickly so they can interact properly, and it can protect a walker quite well, along with blocking a big attacker which allows you to send a huge crackback at them with say, a creature-land, the voice token, souls tokens, and anything else you have laying around. Makes decks like Death's Shadow think twice about attacking, or avoid attacking entirely, which happened at least twice that i can remember.
The split of discard spells I ran was actually 3-3, for the same reason you mentioned!
For Nihil Spellbomb, I wanted some mainboard hate against the graveyard decks and it served me well in the games I drew it. There's almost always a random application for it G1.
I didn't really miss Gavony Township at all, I felt like the creatures I had along with the creature-lands were enough to get the job done in terms of damage. However, I DO feel I missed out by not having 1-2 Ghost Quarter somewhere in the 75. I played against a few Gavony Townships and they were very hard to slog through (and sometimes I couldn't).
A bit sad that there was no Abzan in the top 32 SCG Syracuse. However, 4 copies of abzan made day 2. That's something. Brandon Zadzilka made a strong finish in the SCG Modern Open Syracuse ending 4th.
Hey that's me! If anyone has questions about the deck or the tournament feel free to ask.
I've been testing for SCG Syracuse this weekend, and I'm still trying to round out a few slots of my main deck. I'm not really a big fan of Grim Flayer against death's shadow, I've been playing him for a long time now and he seems kinda meh in this meta. Some of my friends recommended Bitterblossom and Voice of Resurgence, citing their usefulness against eldrazi tron, UW control, and death's shadow, and i was wondering what people on here think of that. I can't really find many lists online playing those cards.
I understand that Jund is better against creature decks. Junk is my favorite deck to play in modern. It's not so much I want to win the whole tournament, I just want to do as well as possible with the deck I enjoy the most. So with taking in all of that advice, here's where I'm at:
Maybe I should play a disfigure in the mainboard to help out a little more with creature decks, but im unsure what to remove. Honestly the mainboard probably isn't getting changed much more, I'm pretty happy with where it's at. I like Nihil Spellbomb as a threat, you make a good point about Coco working around the cage. It's also really great against Living End, which has been an atrocious matchup. Let me know how this looks. (Treetop and Kalitas I want to stay in)
Thanks for taking the time to respond in such an in-depth way, I really appreciate it!
I think because the G1 matchup against Abzan Company decks is so poor, one Kalitas and three Ooze mainboard is kind of a concession to that. I'm currently moving a lot of pieces around with the deck, and I think Tasigur is probably still good even if he hurts the deck a small amount upon being cast. If he's in my opener, I usually can play him and something else on turn 3 or 4, so that's obviously awesome. I don't see Grafdigger's Cage being that big of a problem for my deck, it really only shuts down half of souls, and that card comes out against Abzan Coco anyway along with Liliana. Honestly I also want to sideboard one Rest in Peace, because it's just that good against dredge and company. It's possible that Nihil Spellbomb is better, but that only shuts down one persist trigger off of finks, and still allows Voice to be ridiculous upon dying. I've never really had an issue with Treetop being a 3/3, usually it can smash in with no problem, and a lot of Junk players I know are super pleased with the card.
I think I only want two knights though, and probably 2-3 Siege Rhino, I'm testing basically every day so I can get a feel for things.
(Sorry about the Day of Judgment, that's basically a placeholder for the best 4 mana sweeper I can get my hands on before the tournament lol.)
Well like I said, Rhino can just be really slow or clunky in certain matchups, so I wouldn't want to just jam four of them. I'd rather control the board with cheap resilient threats than beat down.
Okay, so what about:
-1 Tasigur
-1 Knight
-1 Kalitas
+2 Siege Rhino
+? Something else
Two definitely feels better than zero, but I don't know if I should be playing more than that or maybe another inquisition or finks. it's insane when it resolves, but it's pretty mediocre against things like remand and mana leak, and its slow against burn and affinity (assuming burn can skullcrack me). Let me know if you guys have suggestions. I also still would like input on the sideboard
So I'm planning on taking this list to SCG Syracuse. But I think it still needs a few changes. I would greatly appreciate any constructive comments that could help me shape the sideboard or mainboard to give me a better shot at putting up a good record.
I've done quite a bit of playtesting, and I don't think Tasigur is especially great in this version when scooze, knight, goyf, and souls all want certain things in the graveyard. But mostly the problem is that I took a break for the Eldrazi Winter and have only recently returned to seriously playing modern and am somewhat unfamiliar with the current meta in that I know all the decks, just not how popular they are. The questions I have are:
1) Should I be playing Siege Rhino? I used to, but he fell out of favor for things that were grindier, I'm not sure if I need to find room for a few or not.
2) How good is Kalitas? Is two too many?
3) I feel like my sideboard needs work. I have NO idea how good Painful Truths is in modern for example, and I don't know which decks need hating on the most right now.
Again, I'm sure if I bring this deck I'll do alright, I just want it in tip-top shape, and I know you guys can help. So thanks in advance!
After much deliberation, and with help from you folks, I've decided not to go with Tasigur or Alesha. I proposed an idea to my friend group, and they seem into it, so I'm going to be building an Ink-Treader Nephilim deck! My friends and I are each going to build a deck based around one, and I chose this one! So this wacky fella requires me to play some truly janky cards, which become busted when it's on the field! For example, Act of Treason=Insurrection. Here's a list of cards I've found that I'm considering. Let me know of any others!
Thank you for the suggestions, but I have basically narrowed it down to one of these three decks (I actually built a Roon deck for my buddy once, and it was SUPER strong). I'm okay with these decks being graveyard-centric, but I just want to avoid playing a reanimator deck all over again. I don't think Tasigur really supports a reanimator strategy since he has delve and you cannot control what cards he gives you back, but it kind of seems like Alesha is all about filling the yard and then reanimating, so maybe she is off the table...?
Thanks for the feedback! I figured it might help if I threw together mini-decklists of what cards interest me for each deck. If you have comments or want to suggest a commander or theme, please do with as many details as possible!
I am hesitant to pull the trigger on playing Tasigur until I get some feedback regarding his fun levels, since he basically always costs less than four mana to cast and has a solid body to attack with. Oh, and he draws you a card for 4 mana.
Any feedback on any of these three is still welcome, I won't throw any ideas away just yet!
First, some background information before we get into starting this thing. I'm looking for another EDH deck, and I hate repeating deck styles, since it gets stale and some decks end up being strictly worse than other similar ones. For reference, my current decks are:
Karador, Ghost Chieftain: My brutal reanimator deck that can be super competitive or relatively casual depending on who is playing with me. Ghave, Guru of Spores: A deck full to the brim with planeswalkers and counter synergies. Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius: Wizard tribal, with lots of card-drawing effects.
So this new deck I make needs to not be focused on graveyard shenanigans (obviously some are okay), and I wouldn't want another tribal deck. Ghave uses more than enough dice, so I wouldn't want another deck focused on counters either. I've been thinking about it a lot lately and browsing magic's vast library of legends, but I couldn't find a commander that tickled my fancy and screamed "build a deck around me." Since I already have a competitive deck, I want this one to be rather wacky and do something unusual. I've narrowed it down to a few ideas, and I'd like to know what you guys and gals of the magic community have to say!
Idea 1: Some five-color general
This idea certainly seems the most wacky, but I'm very unsure of how to actually build a deck like this. I was thinking it would be rather nifty to include weird cards like the Nephilim cycle, since they can make for some super weird plays. I'm also curious about how I would need to construct the manabase, so if you have any ideas about the manabase or wacky cards to include, let me know! (I'd also obviously need to pick a commander)
Idea 2: Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Now, I've heard that this guy can be just busted and annoying to play against if built properly. If you have a Tasigur deck, let me know if it's fun to pilot and play against. If I were to choose this fella, I'd want to maybe take it in a slightly different direction so as to avoid just making this a worse version of my Karador deck.
Idea 3: Alesha, who Smiles at Death
She seems like she could be fun to build, but again I'm worried about her becoming another "fill the graveyard and go crazy" deck. I'm not sure how her decks play, so again if you have an Alesha deck, I'd appreciate any feedback. If I chose Alesha, I wouldn't want to make her deck into just another mindless aggro deck.
Okay, those are my ideas! I feel like a five color deck could be where I want to take this, but I'm just so unsure of what it would look like that I figured I'd put my next two choices down as well! Hopefully you can help me create a wacky deck that will lead to hours of fun for my playgroup!
Thanks, no problem! I'm glad I can contribute to helping the Abzan community. Sometimes it's not enough to just have Liliana, I also had one piece of hand removal to take I think a Pact out of his hand. Variance may have been on my side since he didn't rip his Prime Times after that. Game 3 I saw more midrange cards like Courser in against me and they just died without helping him much.
Treetop Village has been awesome! It applies so much quick pressure for only 1G, and it has trample so tiny chump blockers can't stop it. I like it for assassinating planeswalkers like Karn and Lilianas, too. Having a third creature-land also just makes you have less dead draws later in games.
Thank you very much! I think it worked out well, if you have a Veil in play and draw a Last Hope, you have the choice to -2 the Veil for value and cast the Last Hope, or just discard the Hope, so it won't be a dead draw. Last Hope is very good against Counters Company and Affinity, she's able to pick off creature after creature for free each turn, and in the mirror she lets your Goyfs always be bigger and can come out, -2 to get a creature, and still absorb a removal spell from your opponent. Her ultimate is also an instant game over against any midrange/control deck, whereas Veil is only sometimes an instant KO, and Veil cannot plus to protect herself. Basically between the two of them I think they cover all your bases nicely.
I'm still on the fence about it, since it's basically dead against some decks like Storm and Affinity, and I have very little room to move numbers around it seems like. I don't think I would end up putting more than 1 in the main.
Round 1: Burn, 2-1
Somehow I managed to take game 1 by casting no creatures, swinging with shambling vent, and binning Liliana, the Last Hope for a ton of zombies. Game two he basically had the nuts and kinda wrecked me. Game three I was able to curve Inquisition of Kozilek into Collective Brutality, which basically ended the game. Sideboarding was pretty simple, take out my totally dead cards for more useful ones. it's possible I should have taken out a Souls instead of spellbomb, though they're both pretty bad.
Out: Thoughtseize x3, Dark Confidant x3, Nihil Spellbomb
In: Kitchen Finks x2, Collective Brutality x2, Blessed Alliance, Abrupt Decay, Flaying Tendrils
Round 2: RG Titanshift, 2-1
I won games 1 and 3 by playing Liliana of the Veil on turn 3 on the play, which was pretty darn good. He punked me out game 2 with an early Prime Time, as that deck tends to do. The Extraction brought in was mostly for Primeval Titan should I steal it from his hand or kill one, but also possibly for Valakut if he was to pitch it to Liliana. Souls feels too slow against them.
Out: Fatal Push x3, Lingering Souls x2, Nihil Spellbomb
In: Kitchen Finks x2, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2, Surgical Extraction x1
Round 3: Esper Goryo's Vengeance, 2-1
This was the fringey-est deck i played against, and I didn't really know it was a thing until my friend played against it the day before in the Open. Thankfully, I got the idea pretty quickly and knew how I wanted to sideboard. Game 1, we were in topdeck mode and he peeled Elesh Norn on seven mana and crushed me with Creeping Tar Pits while wiping my board. Game 2 I disrupted him pretty heavily with a Surgical Extraction and beat down with Goyfs, and game 3 he kept a LOT of removal in his opener but I curved Liliana, the Last Hope into Gideon, Ally of Zendikar and the game was pretty much over from that point on (ended up with 2 Gideon emblems and a Lili emblem). My creature lands were very good in this matchup as well. I trimmed on Lilianas because I didn't want him discarding value, abrupt decay is pretty bad, but Push still hits tar Pits and baby Jace.
Out: Abrupt Decay x2, Fatal Push x1, Liliana of the Veil x2, Inquisition of Kozilek x1
In: Surgical Extraction x2, Kitchen Finks x2, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2
Round 4: GW Value-Town, 0-2
Oh boy did I get smashed in this one. Thankfully my opponent was nice and we had a lot of fun with it. Game 1 he landed a bunch of dorks and Gavony Township and I really couldn't do much but play creatures that eventually got outsized. If I had drawn a Liliana of some sort it might have ended differently because I had a decent amount of chumpers. Game 2 I was able to land a Gideon with protection, but a sick Collected Company hit was able to snipe him and I fell too far behind from there. Liliana is bad against GW go-wide decks, and I didn't want hand hate that couldn't hit Collected Company. Siege Rhino was the last cut and just seemed like the worst remaining card.
Out: Liliana of the Veil x3, Inquisition of Kozilek x3, Siege Rhino x1
In: Flaying Tendrils, Collective Brutality x1, Kitchen Finks x2, Damnation, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2
Round 5: Abzan, 2-0
This round was interesting. He was running a list that played Knight of the Reliquary, Vault of the Archangel, Gavony Township, and Bitterblossom. Game 1 I just had better draws and rode a Liliana of the Veil and two Dark Confidant triggers to victory. Game 2 my opponent made a mistake that I think cost him the game. He had bitterblossom and 3 faeries out, and cast lingering souls, but used the same token to represent all of the fliers. Next turn, he swung with two of the fliers and I asked if they were spirits, faeries, or what. He seemed to think it didn't matter and attacked with the spirits, which next turn allowed me to Maelstrom Pulse all the faeries away and get in too much damage for him to recover from, as he had left all his mana open hoping to activate Vault on defense. I boarded out the hand hate as usual for the mirror and mirror-esque matches as well as Lilianas which seemed generally bad against a token heavy Abzan list. I bring in the most two-for-one-ish cards I have as well as more removal for bitterblossom and tokens. Brutality was the last card to come in and was just better than the third Liliana.
Out: Inquisition of Kozilek x3, Thoughtseize x3, Liliana of the Veil x3
In: Abrupt Decay, Maelstrom Pulse, Damnation, Flaying Tendrils, Kitchen Finks x2, Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2, Collective Brutality x1
Round 6: Death's Shadow, 2-0
This round went really smoothly for me. My removal lined up well against his threats, and drawing 3+ of any combination of Voice of Resurgence, Lingering Souls, and Siege Rhino is basically enough to KO them. Voice was extremely disruptive game 1, and he was forced to Push the Voice main phase and terminate the huge token, then ended up using Pushes and Terminates on single souls tokens before losing to more. Post board I bring in even more annoying cards like Gideon and Finks. I feel pretty favored in this matchup, especially post-board. I feel like I can bring out the hand hate for more resilient threats and less bad topdecks.
Out: Inquisition of Kozilek x3, Thoughtseize x3, Fatal Push x1
In: Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2, Kitchen Finks x2, Blessed Alliance, Damnation, Maelstrom Pulse
Round 7: UR Gifts Storm, 2-1
Game 1 I disrupted him fairly well, but my Bob betrayed me and kept flipping Lingering Souls and Maelstrom Pulse, which left me dead to a non-combo Grapeshot for 7. Nihil Spellbomb and hand hate, along with a 6/7 Tarmogoyf took game 2 for me, and then Game 3 I saw his opener and chose to rip a combo piece out and leave him with Blood Moon, and just play around moon since it did nothing to help him combo. I brought in an extra Pulse in case he was able to cast an Empty the Warrens for a bunch, and took out my six slowest, non-disruptive cards.
Out: Lingering Souls x4, Liliana, the Last Hope, Siege Rhino x1
In: Abrupt Decay, Surgical Extraction x2, Collective Brutality x2, Maelstrom Pulse
Round 8: Death's Shadow, 2-0
This was honestly the easiest match of the day, partially because both of my openers were 3 Land, Voice, Souls, Rhino, and a kill spell. He stripped my kill spell game one and lost to Voice+Souls+Rhino, then game 2 he took the Voice but lost to Path+Liliana+Pulse.
Out: Inquisition of Kozilek x3, Thoughtseize x3, Fatal Push x1
In: Gideon, Ally of Zendikar x2, Kitchen Finks x2, Blessed Alliance, Damnation, Maelstrom Pulse
Round 9: Intentional Draw (Clean Cut to Top 8)
Quarterfinals: UW Control 2-0
Game 1 I had the wombo combo of T1 Inquisiton, T2 Bob, T3 Liliana of the Veil; even though the Bob bit the dust to Path, he didn't have a counter for Liliana, and she stripped him of too many cards. Game 2 we both had ridiculous draws for at least seven consecutive turns after Liliana of the Veil brought us into topdeck mode very quickly (Something like Bob for me into D-sphere for him into Abrupt Decay for me into Path for him into Souls for me into Gideon for him into Maelstrom Pulse for me), but fortunately Liliana was still out for that entire time and I rode the ultimate to victory after ripping Souls, Souls, Finks while he hit mostly lands. I took out one Goyf to limit bad draws against an inevitable Rest in Peace, and kept in a few Paths over Pushes because it hits Collonades as well as Gideon if he swings.
Out: Fatal Push x3, Siege Rhino x2, Abrupt Decay x1, Path to Exile x1
In: Collective Brutality x2, Kitchen Finks x2, Maelstrom Pulse, Gideon, Ally of Zendikdar x2
Semifinals: Burn, 1-2
Game 1, he got one too many Goblin Guide hits, and I got land each time, it just didn't matter because of how awkward my lands ended up being that game. I had to shock myself which basically ended up giving him enough gas to kill me before I could stabilize. Game 2 I had the Push for the Guide and the Inquisition for the Eidolon, and turn 3 I had a 5/6 Goyf that clocked him very quickly along with a Shambling Vent and a Voice, which sealed the deal when he was forced to give me an Elemental token by bolting my Shambling Vent. Game 3 my hand was a little risky in that my only life gain was a Kitchen Finks, but it had removal, lands, and disruption so I went with it. It basically came down to whether or not he had the Skullcrack for my Finks and unfortunately, he did.
Out: Thoughtseize x3, Dark Confidant x3, Nihil Spellbomb
In: Kitchen Finks x2, Collective Brutality x2, Blessed Alliance, Abrupt Decay, Flaying Tendrils
Overall I had a great experience, and had a lot of fun playing the deck and talking with my opponents, especially in the top 8 where basically all we did was joke with each other (I also played magic to the best of my ability). I really liked how Voice performed for me. Granted, I didn't play against Eldrazi Tron, but I feel like it's not as bad as it seems against them, since it survives All is Dust, and the Elemental can often tangle with the bigger Eldrazi just fine. In the testing I did against Spaghetti Tron it didn't seem like a liability. I think I would want a Ghost Quarter and one more card against Burn somewhere in the 75, but other than that I feel really good about this list. That does it for the tournament run-down, I'll do my best to answer any questions/suggestions!
Thank you! I'll definitely get a tournament report by tomorrow, but for now I'll just answer those bullet points.
Voice of Resurgence was very good for me, against death's shadow and control they need to get rid of it quickly so they can interact properly, and it can protect a walker quite well, along with blocking a big attacker which allows you to send a huge crackback at them with say, a creature-land, the voice token, souls tokens, and anything else you have laying around. Makes decks like Death's Shadow think twice about attacking, or avoid attacking entirely, which happened at least twice that i can remember.
The split of discard spells I ran was actually 3-3, for the same reason you mentioned!
For Nihil Spellbomb, I wanted some mainboard hate against the graveyard decks and it served me well in the games I drew it. There's almost always a random application for it G1.
I didn't really miss Gavony Township at all, I felt like the creatures I had along with the creature-lands were enough to get the job done in terms of damage. However, I DO feel I missed out by not having 1-2 Ghost Quarter somewhere in the 75. I played against a few Gavony Townships and they were very hard to slog through (and sometimes I couldn't).
Hey that's me! If anyone has questions about the deck or the tournament feel free to ask.
4x Tarmogoyf
3x Scavenging Ooze
2x Kitchen Finks
2x Knight of the Reliquary
1x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
2x Siege Rhino
1x Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Instants/Sorceries (19)
1x Slaughter Pact
4x Path to Exile
3x Inquisition of Kozilek
2x Thoughtseize
4x Abrupt Decay
4x Lingering Souls
1x Maelstrom Pulse
3x Liliana of the Veil
Lands (23)
1x Vault of the Archangel
1x Ghost Quarter
4x Verdant catacombs
4x Marsh Flats
2x Overgrown Tomb
1x Godless Shrine
1x Temple Garden
1x Twilight Mire
1x Horizon Canopy
2x Stirring Wildwood
1x Treetop Village
1x Forest
2x Swamp
1x Plains
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Grafdigger's Cage
2x Stony Silence
2x Kor Firewalker
1x Dromoka's Command
1x Zealous Persecution
2x Fulminator Mage
1x 4-mana Sweeper
2x Leyline of Sanctity
Maybe I should play a disfigure in the mainboard to help out a little more with creature decks, but im unsure what to remove. Honestly the mainboard probably isn't getting changed much more, I'm pretty happy with where it's at. I like Nihil Spellbomb as a threat, you make a good point about Coco working around the cage. It's also really great against Living End, which has been an atrocious matchup. Let me know how this looks. (Treetop and Kalitas I want to stay in)
I think because the G1 matchup against Abzan Company decks is so poor, one Kalitas and three Ooze mainboard is kind of a concession to that. I'm currently moving a lot of pieces around with the deck, and I think Tasigur is probably still good even if he hurts the deck a small amount upon being cast. If he's in my opener, I usually can play him and something else on turn 3 or 4, so that's obviously awesome. I don't see Grafdigger's Cage being that big of a problem for my deck, it really only shuts down half of souls, and that card comes out against Abzan Coco anyway along with Liliana. Honestly I also want to sideboard one Rest in Peace, because it's just that good against dredge and company. It's possible that Nihil Spellbomb is better, but that only shuts down one persist trigger off of finks, and still allows Voice to be ridiculous upon dying. I've never really had an issue with Treetop being a 3/3, usually it can smash in with no problem, and a lot of Junk players I know are super pleased with the card.
I think I only want two knights though, and probably 2-3 Siege Rhino, I'm testing basically every day so I can get a feel for things.
(Sorry about the Day of Judgment, that's basically a placeholder for the best 4 mana sweeper I can get my hands on before the tournament lol.)
-1 Tasigur
-1 Knight
-1 Kalitas
+2 Siege Rhino
+? Something else
Two definitely feels better than zero, but I don't know if I should be playing more than that or maybe another inquisition or finks. it's insane when it resolves, but it's pretty mediocre against things like remand and mana leak, and its slow against burn and affinity (assuming burn can skullcrack me). Let me know if you guys have suggestions. I also still would like input on the sideboard
4x Tarmogoyf
3x Scavenging Ooze
2x Kitchen Finks
3x Knight of the Reliquary
2x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1x Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Instants/Sorceries (19)
1x Slaughter Pact
4x Path to Exile
3x Inquisition of Kozilek
2x Thoughtseize
4x Abrupt Decay
4x Lingering Souls
1x Maelstrom Pulse
3x Liliana of the Veil
Lands (23)
1x Vault of the Archangel
1x Ghost Quarter
4x Verdant catacombs
4x Marsh Flats
2x Overgrown Tomb
2x Godless Shrine
1x Temple Garden
1x Twilight Mire
1x Horizon Canopy
2x Stirring Wildwood
1x Treetop Village
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Grafdigger's Cage
2x Stony Silence
2x Kor Firewalker
2x Dromoka's Command
1x Zealous Persecution
2x Choke
1x Fulminator Mage
1x Day of Judgment
2x Leyline of Sanctity
I've done quite a bit of playtesting, and I don't think Tasigur is especially great in this version when scooze, knight, goyf, and souls all want certain things in the graveyard. But mostly the problem is that I took a break for the Eldrazi Winter and have only recently returned to seriously playing modern and am somewhat unfamiliar with the current meta in that I know all the decks, just not how popular they are. The questions I have are:
1) Should I be playing Siege Rhino? I used to, but he fell out of favor for things that were grindier, I'm not sure if I need to find room for a few or not.
2) How good is Kalitas? Is two too many?
3) I feel like my sideboard needs work. I have NO idea how good Painful Truths is in modern for example, and I don't know which decks need hating on the most right now.
Again, I'm sure if I bring this deck I'll do alright, I just want it in tip-top shape, and I know you guys can help. So thanks in advance!
1x Ink-Treader Nephilim
Creatures
1x Eternal Witness
1x Archaeomancer
1x Mnemonic Wall
1x Izzet Chronarch
Enchantments
1x Shield of the Oversoul
Spells
1x Defiant Strike
1x Pillar of Flame
1x Banefire
1x Magma Jet
1x Force Away
1x Izzet Charm
1x Simic Charm
1x Hunter's Insight
1x Beast Within
1x Crippling Chill
1x Repulse
1x Kodama's Reach
1x Act of Treason
1x Cackling Counterpart
1x Electrolyze
1x Bant Charm
1x Adverse Conditions
1x Warleader's Helix
1x Turn Against
1x Exert Influence
1x Riddle of Lightning
1x Prophetic Bolt
1x Trostani's Judgment
1x Child of Alara
1x Cromat
1x Horde of Notions
1x Progenitus
1x Dune-Brood Nephilim
1x Glint-Eye Nephilim
1x Ink-Treader Nephilim
1x Witch-Maw Nephilim
1x Yore-Tiller Nephilim
1x Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Creatures (3)
1x Riftsweeper
1x Misthollow Griffin
1x Torrent Elemental
1x Training Grounds
Spells (3)
1x Villainous Wealth
1x Treasure Cruise
1x Dig Through Time
1x Alesha, who Smiles at Death
Creatures (3)
1x Reveillark
1x Karmic Guide
1x Aurelia, the Warleader
1x Savage Beating
1x World at War
I am hesitant to pull the trigger on playing Tasigur until I get some feedback regarding his fun levels, since he basically always costs less than four mana to cast and has a solid body to attack with. Oh, and he draws you a card for 4 mana.
Any feedback on any of these three is still welcome, I won't throw any ideas away just yet!
Karador, Ghost Chieftain: My brutal reanimator deck that can be super competitive or relatively casual depending on who is playing with me.
Ghave, Guru of Spores: A deck full to the brim with planeswalkers and counter synergies.
Niv-Mizzet, Dracogenius: Wizard tribal, with lots of card-drawing effects.
So this new deck I make needs to not be focused on graveyard shenanigans (obviously some are okay), and I wouldn't want another tribal deck. Ghave uses more than enough dice, so I wouldn't want another deck focused on counters either. I've been thinking about it a lot lately and browsing magic's vast library of legends, but I couldn't find a commander that tickled my fancy and screamed "build a deck around me." Since I already have a competitive deck, I want this one to be rather wacky and do something unusual. I've narrowed it down to a few ideas, and I'd like to know what you guys and gals of the magic community have to say!
Idea 1: Some five-color general
This idea certainly seems the most wacky, but I'm very unsure of how to actually build a deck like this. I was thinking it would be rather nifty to include weird cards like the Nephilim cycle, since they can make for some super weird plays. I'm also curious about how I would need to construct the manabase, so if you have any ideas about the manabase or wacky cards to include, let me know! (I'd also obviously need to pick a commander)
Idea 2: Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Now, I've heard that this guy can be just busted and annoying to play against if built properly. If you have a Tasigur deck, let me know if it's fun to pilot and play against. If I were to choose this fella, I'd want to maybe take it in a slightly different direction so as to avoid just making this a worse version of my Karador deck.
Idea 3: Alesha, who Smiles at Death
She seems like she could be fun to build, but again I'm worried about her becoming another "fill the graveyard and go crazy" deck. I'm not sure how her decks play, so again if you have an Alesha deck, I'd appreciate any feedback. If I chose Alesha, I wouldn't want to make her deck into just another mindless aggro deck.
Okay, those are my ideas! I feel like a five color deck could be where I want to take this, but I'm just so unsure of what it would look like that I figured I'd put my next two choices down as well! Hopefully you can help me create a wacky deck that will lead to hours of fun for my playgroup!