No. Not even close. Dispel is way better. The reason that we could play gigadrowse before is that modern had less cheap interaction. In particular the removal that mattered to us was abrupt decay and there were a lot more expensive counterspells being played (cryptics, etc) so gigadrowse could pretty reliably limit our opponents to one piece of interaction at most and usually less. And even then it was crap and people shouldn't have been playing it because the only scenario where it was better was against abrupt decay except few decks played decay and counterspells.
Sorry about that, I wasn't thinking. We would need two pieces to deal with it mainboard so probably voyage and repeal or bolt and a bounce.
I agree with you re oiling the engine. It's why we cut scroll and echoing truth pretty early into testing. To be perfectly honest I'm pretty convinced messing around with the maindeck isn't a good idea. Human's is a small enough percentage of the meta. However I do think it merits some sideboard consideration. Maybe we should bring back pyroclasm and/or anger of the gods (probably clasm since it doesn't kill baral).
The human's matchup is miserable. And it doesn't help that Collins plays at my LGS. It's kinda dumb because if they don't draw thalia or meddling mage the matchup is laughably easy but if they do it can be game over. Empty is kinda mediocre against humans because mantis rider makes it difficult to use it just to buy time and and empty for 8 or even 10 can be out raced a bit too easily if it's past turn 2 or 3.
If I were going to play a maindeck answer repeal is by far the easiest to slot in. If you're playing with a noxious revival (and you should be) then gifts for grapeshot, noxious revival, manamorphose and repeal will clear a meddling mage so the humans player may try and name either gifts or past in flames both of which are very beatable.
Anyways I've been messing around with maindeck pieces of the puzzle since I've been noticing in a very large portion of games gifts isn't really necessary. Often times it's just a crutch to make the combo turn go a little faster and be 100% instead of 99%. And there's been a lot of discard going around recently and pieces has been quite solid.
I don't think storm is really deserving of a ban. Paper magic is just a bit slow to adapt to it. I've been facing some pretty absurd amounts of hate on MTGO.
People aren't packing enough variety of answers to storm. This is really no different from legacy storm. You can interact with storm 3 ways: permanent hate (rule of law, RIP, etc), counterspells (Dispel, Negate, etc), discard (IoK, Thoughtseize, etc), and a fast clock. You really need a mix of disruption to beat storm because we'll beat pretty much any one kind on it's own. Discard: Just make land drop and cast PiF; Counterspells: Play slow until you can overload them since our spells cost half the price of their's; Permanent Hate: Bounce it; Fast Clock: win on turn 3/4.
The big thing I've found is that people don't respect empty anywhere near as much as they should. If I were playing a deck that is soft to empty (shadow, etc) I would want multiple ways to answer it post board. But people just don't seem to have these. Of the decks that are soft to empty from the last SCG event no one is playing more than 4 cards that interact well with empty and most are just play two. That's not enough especially when some of those cards are on the slow side (All is Dust) or are too reactive (Battle rage in particular). People aren't really preparing well enough for storm. Storm isn't like affinity where your hate is pretty narrow. Basically all storm hate outside of Eidolon, Rule of Law and Canonist is quite useful in other matchups. For example if you're playing UW control maybe instead of multiple wraths play a copy of EE or two so you can hold up mana rather than tapping out.
But what I'm really saying is please don't ban another storm card (unless you give us back probe and then you can ban gifts).
Storm isn't a turbo xerox deck though. Storm decks sort of follow their own rules. We can afford to miss land drops more than turbo xerox and we don't use cantrips in the same way that turbo xerox does.
I'd have to do some math but I'm pretty sure that 17 lands is the correct number. 18 in a control heavy meta where you're playing lots of copies of peer might be reasonable.
@Charm_Master3125 That's mostly correct except most of the time you want empty you want all 3. Don't be afraid to be more aggressive in sideboarding. Meddling Mage, wow. I haven't played against that out of a real deck in years. As for surgical know how to play around it is important. Noxious Revival helps a lot but so does just know how to kill without gifts. Peer makes this much easier since it sees 5 deep.
I'm something like 95% sure that 16 lands is not enough. When we had probe we played 16 lands with 16 1 mana cantrips. You're on 12 although opt is admittedly better than thought scour but you're playing less cantrips and you need more mana. I don't think you can safely go below 17 lands.
My main deck is 2 cards off of yours. I'm +1 mountain -1 opt. I really really like peer but it is more mana intensive. Mountain is there because of ghost quarter and path. I think it's still very much worthwhile because those are still pretty common sideboard cards.
As for the sideboard it's pretty much up in the air except for 2 Shattering Spree and 3 Empty the Warrens. Yours is a good base although I wouldn't play 3 echoing truth.
@MedallionBear It's bad. Like really bad. It doesn't kill chalice on two so I consider it unplayable as artifact hate goes right now. It's the same reason I think that Wear/Tear is unplayable right now. If we lose on the spot to chalice on two our already bad matchup against E Tron gets a billion times worse.
As creature removal it is also quite bad. It's too expensive to kill Thalia without falling incredibly behind on tempo, doesn't kill Eidolon of Rhetoric at all and is really expensive against Eidolon of the Great Revel.
Over all it's just a bad card in Storm. It's just a bit too expensive, too slow and chalice is everywhere. It's really really clunky in the most efficient deck in modern. It's much much better in legacy storm than modern storm.
@Charm Master. I think you missed something. A turn three kill assuming you untap with two lands in play is: Ritual, Ritual, Manamorphose, Reducer, Gifts. If you play a reducer on 3 and manage to untap the next turn all you need is one ritual have the kill.
From when I tested Opt in old Ascension storm Sleight of Hand still felt much better. The instant speed stuff just isn't that relevant and this isn't preordain. It's not strictly better but I feel Sleight of Hand is still better. Although I'm still going to play both.
Here's my quick list:
8 Reducers
12 Rituals
2 Past in Flames
4 Gifts Ungiven
3 Grapeshot
4 Serum Visions
4 Sleight of Hand
1 Noxious Revival
4 Opt
18 Lands
However I'm not sold on that list. In part 18 lands may be too many. With 12 Cantrips I think we can safely run 17 lands if we wanted to. It would slightly hurt the control matchups where we really need to hit our 4th land drop but it would be a net positive. I do really like Peer Through Depths so maybe some number of Opt should be peers but that's too much fine tuning for right now.
I think opt is another argument for running fetchless. As always this is conditional on not running Moons. I'm still not sold on it but I'll probably test it some more. Although I really dislike playing the Cascade Bluffs so maybe only 17 lands is the way to go.
I think that the fetchless version is worthwhile but the lack of fetches can be a downside admittedly not all that often. The real problem is that you can't play Blood Moon with the fetchless list. I think the marginal gain from Blood Moon is higher than from not shuffling however I can very easily envision a meta in which that is not the case. I'm missing a couple of the cards for the fetchless list but I'll give it a shot when I get the chance. From testing online it feels pretty good. Although I really want to find a way to play 1-2 copies less copies of Shivan Reef.
@pmc18823 I've had a very different experience with GDS sideboards. For me Kozilek's Return, Izzet Static Caster and Anger of the Gods are the most popular sweepers all of which are easily cast under moon.
Congrats on the finish. How did you find 7 mancers? I really love play the full 8 but I can see the argument for playing 7.
I've been really liking Moon again. It's just a stupidly powerful magic card and we can take advantage of it quite well.
I don't particularly care for the stripped down version you're playing. I find it hurts the grindy matchups too much. Making your third and fourth land drops is too important in some matchups.
I like your sideboarding. I should probably be more willing to cut Sleight of Hand. However I completely disagree with how you board against GDS. I don't like Moon very much (although I should test it more) and I quite like keep in grapeshot. Making land drops 3 and 4 against GDS and then killing then when the go to 8 or 10 life tends to be fairly simple.
How was the lack of bounce spells for you in the sideboard? You seems pretty soft to leylines but that's probably fine since they're not very common righ now.
I've been on 2 Remand/3 Grapeshot but I'm going to try out 4 Remand, 2 Grapeshot tonight.
Shatterstorm if you're not worried about chalice, shattering spree if you are. Vandalblast is just worse.
Dispel or Swan Song. I lean towards Dispel but I'm not sold either way.
Dismember and Pyroclasm are what I'm on right now but this is both a meta and a personal choice. Pretty much every configuration is reasonable.
I've been liking Noxious Revival on MTGO (except for the maindeck RIPs out of three different affinity players) but it definitely can be bad in some matchups. I want to test with it a lot more but I think it's a bit of a meta call. It's quite bad in the midrange matchups where you need to grind around discard and removal but it can be good in the fast matchups. It's OK against control as a way to get better value out of late game gifts and to make it easier to double grapeshot. However I think having a 3rd grapeshot may just be better than Revival.
I don't care for 3 Bolt and 2 Dismember. It seems like a bit much spot removal for me. I would go:
2x Lightning Bolt
2x Dismember
2x Echoing Truth
3x Empty the Warrens (2x if you're running one maindeck)
2x Vandalblast (I like Shattering Spree or Shatterstorm more though)
2x Dispel
2x Pyroclasm
My first Competitive League went well. I went 4-1 with a pretty standard list. My only loss was to grixis shadow. I played against: 2 Titan Shift, 1 Grixis Shadow, 1 Affinity, 1 Grishoalbrand. I did lose a game against Grishoalbrand to: double spirit guide into manamorphose into dispel which was hilarious.
They both suck a lot. Grixis shadow isn't quite as bad as it looks. I've said it before but play skill is a huge factor in this matchup. Pieces also makes it much more winnable.
To fight against D&T I reccomend trying out pyroclasm (much easier to cast under Thalia than Anger) and some number of Dismember. I would trim on Blood Moon to fit all of this.
I just won my first match of UR Storm online. I know I shouldn't be hyped because I've been playing Storm for years but it feels good to win (especially through a relic).
I agree with you re oiling the engine. It's why we cut scroll and echoing truth pretty early into testing. To be perfectly honest I'm pretty convinced messing around with the maindeck isn't a good idea. Human's is a small enough percentage of the meta. However I do think it merits some sideboard consideration. Maybe we should bring back pyroclasm and/or anger of the gods (probably clasm since it doesn't kill baral).
If I were going to play a maindeck answer repeal is by far the easiest to slot in. If you're playing with a noxious revival (and you should be) then gifts for grapeshot, noxious revival, manamorphose and repeal will clear a meddling mage so the humans player may try and name either gifts or past in flames both of which are very beatable.
Anyways I've been messing around with maindeck pieces of the puzzle since I've been noticing in a very large portion of games gifts isn't really necessary. Often times it's just a crutch to make the combo turn go a little faster and be 100% instead of 99%. And there's been a lot of discard going around recently and pieces has been quite solid.
People aren't packing enough variety of answers to storm. This is really no different from legacy storm. You can interact with storm 3 ways: permanent hate (rule of law, RIP, etc), counterspells (Dispel, Negate, etc), discard (IoK, Thoughtseize, etc), and a fast clock. You really need a mix of disruption to beat storm because we'll beat pretty much any one kind on it's own. Discard: Just make land drop and cast PiF; Counterspells: Play slow until you can overload them since our spells cost half the price of their's; Permanent Hate: Bounce it; Fast Clock: win on turn 3/4.
The big thing I've found is that people don't respect empty anywhere near as much as they should. If I were playing a deck that is soft to empty (shadow, etc) I would want multiple ways to answer it post board. But people just don't seem to have these. Of the decks that are soft to empty from the last SCG event no one is playing more than 4 cards that interact well with empty and most are just play two. That's not enough especially when some of those cards are on the slow side (All is Dust) or are too reactive (Battle rage in particular). People aren't really preparing well enough for storm. Storm isn't like affinity where your hate is pretty narrow. Basically all storm hate outside of Eidolon, Rule of Law and Canonist is quite useful in other matchups. For example if you're playing UW control maybe instead of multiple wraths play a copy of EE or two so you can hold up mana rather than tapping out.
But what I'm really saying is please don't ban another storm card (unless you give us back probe and then you can ban gifts).
I'd have to do some math but I'm pretty sure that 17 lands is the correct number. 18 in a control heavy meta where you're playing lots of copies of peer might be reasonable.
@Charm_Master3125 That's mostly correct except most of the time you want empty you want all 3. Don't be afraid to be more aggressive in sideboarding. Meddling Mage, wow. I haven't played against that out of a real deck in years. As for surgical know how to play around it is important. Noxious Revival helps a lot but so does just know how to kill without gifts. Peer makes this much easier since it sees 5 deep.
My main deck is 2 cards off of yours. I'm +1 mountain -1 opt. I really really like peer but it is more mana intensive. Mountain is there because of ghost quarter and path. I think it's still very much worthwhile because those are still pretty common sideboard cards.
As for the sideboard it's pretty much up in the air except for 2 Shattering Spree and 3 Empty the Warrens. Yours is a good base although I wouldn't play 3 echoing truth.
As creature removal it is also quite bad. It's too expensive to kill Thalia without falling incredibly behind on tempo, doesn't kill Eidolon of Rhetoric at all and is really expensive against Eidolon of the Great Revel.
Over all it's just a bad card in Storm. It's just a bit too expensive, too slow and chalice is everywhere. It's really really clunky in the most efficient deck in modern. It's much much better in legacy storm than modern storm.
Here's my quick list:
8 Reducers
12 Rituals
2 Past in Flames
4 Gifts Ungiven
3 Grapeshot
4 Serum Visions
4 Sleight of Hand
1 Noxious Revival
4 Opt
18 Lands
However I'm not sold on that list. In part 18 lands may be too many. With 12 Cantrips I think we can safely run 17 lands if we wanted to. It would slightly hurt the control matchups where we really need to hit our 4th land drop but it would be a net positive. I do really like Peer Through Depths so maybe some number of Opt should be peers but that's too much fine tuning for right now.
I think opt is another argument for running fetchless. As always this is conditional on not running Moons. I'm still not sold on it but I'll probably test it some more. Although I really dislike playing the Cascade Bluffs so maybe only 17 lands is the way to go.
@pmc18823 I've had a very different experience with GDS sideboards. For me Kozilek's Return, Izzet Static Caster and Anger of the Gods are the most popular sweepers all of which are easily cast under moon.
I've been really liking Moon again. It's just a stupidly powerful magic card and we can take advantage of it quite well.
I don't particularly care for the stripped down version you're playing. I find it hurts the grindy matchups too much. Making your third and fourth land drops is too important in some matchups.
I like your sideboarding. I should probably be more willing to cut Sleight of Hand. However I completely disagree with how you board against GDS. I don't like Moon very much (although I should test it more) and I quite like keep in grapeshot. Making land drops 3 and 4 against GDS and then killing then when the go to 8 or 10 life tends to be fairly simple.
How was the lack of bounce spells for you in the sideboard? You seems pretty soft to leylines but that's probably fine since they're not very common righ now.
Again, congratulations on your great finish!
Shatterstorm if you're not worried about chalice, shattering spree if you are. Vandalblast is just worse.
Dispel or Swan Song. I lean towards Dispel but I'm not sold either way.
Dismember and Pyroclasm are what I'm on right now but this is both a meta and a personal choice. Pretty much every configuration is reasonable.
I've been liking Noxious Revival on MTGO (except for the maindeck RIPs out of three different affinity players) but it definitely can be bad in some matchups. I want to test with it a lot more but I think it's a bit of a meta call. It's quite bad in the midrange matchups where you need to grind around discard and removal but it can be good in the fast matchups. It's OK against control as a way to get better value out of late game gifts and to make it easier to double grapeshot. However I think having a 3rd grapeshot may just be better than Revival.
2x Lightning Bolt
2x Dismember
2x Echoing Truth
3x Empty the Warrens (2x if you're running one maindeck)
2x Vandalblast (I like Shattering Spree or Shatterstorm more though)
2x Dispel
2x Pyroclasm
My first Competitive League went well. I went 4-1 with a pretty standard list. My only loss was to grixis shadow. I played against: 2 Titan Shift, 1 Grixis Shadow, 1 Affinity, 1 Grishoalbrand. I did lose a game against Grishoalbrand to: double spirit guide into manamorphose into dispel which was hilarious.
To fight against D&T I reccomend trying out pyroclasm (much easier to cast under Thalia than Anger) and some number of Dismember. I would trim on Blood Moon to fit all of this.
I just won my first match of UR Storm online. I know I shouldn't be hyped because I've been playing Storm for years but it feels good to win (especially through a relic).