How many Spatial Contortions has everyone been running lately? It isn't particularly effective against Death's Shadow, but is still one of the few ways we can kill problematic creatures like Steel Overseer or Eidolon of the Great Revel. I tend to run a 2:1 split between the main and the sideboard, but I was wondering what the general consensus was.
How are people liking Gemstone Caverns? I'm always torn on the card because it feels like it's good in one very specific spot, but that spot comes up in a very small amount of games. I always feel like Ghost Quarter is more relevant in most games, and naturally drawing one in the late game can actually be useful instead of just getting a legendary colorless land. Is Caverns much better in multiples? Urborg is also something I've considered because of Dismembers and Surgical Extractions in the board. I haven't used Tec Edge in a long time because it's clunkier to use, especially against Inkmoth Nexus.
Which card are people preferring for graveyard hate out of the sideboard? I'm mainly thinking about Surgical Extraction vs. Relic of Progenitus vs. Tormod's Crypt, but I'm still interested to know what people are using if those options aren't being used. Also, for a sideboard with 2 copies of Surgical and 3 Dismembers, does Urborg become a relevant utility land to consider? I tend to run 24 lands 2 Talisman, so Urborg would probably replace Gemstone Caverns.
Hey everybody, I've been using this deck for a while and thought I would share my list. I really don't enjoy the fragile nature of the Atog + Fling combo and would much rather play multiple tough threats which is why the combo is not present. I also think that post board it gets much harder to execute the combo, as our artifacts are often being hated on by the opponent. This led me to my more resilient version of the deck.
The cards I added instead of 4 Atog and 2 Fling were 2 Bonesplitter, 2 Vault Skirge, and 2 Perilous Research. I used to have various splits of Skirge and Bonesplitter, without any Researches, but I found that I could not reach a split I liked. Also, lowering the curve of the deck by cutting 6 two mana cards for 6 one mana cards meant that I got flooded more frequently, so Perilous Research was my solution. One main reason I like this version is that there are 4 more artifacts to play on turn 1, which contributes to our nut draws. Vault Skirge is also another early enabler for our Springleaf Drums, a card that needs to be active if we want our occasional turn 2 Myr Enforcer shenanigans. Skirge also holds equipment really well, particularly Bonesplitter, which I added to make all of our Frogmites and other creatures relevant in the lategame if our opponent played a big creature like an Angler. It also helps us establish a clock in the air now that the list includes 6 flyers.
Sideboarding is pretty simple with this deck and usually involves taking out some combination of Research, Skirge, or Splitter. Against red decks we almost always bring in 4 Hydroblast to deal with Gorilla Shaman. This gives us 8 ways to kill it if we include our 4 Galvanic Blast. To make room, I usually side out Research and Splitter because those cards are worse when we can't stick an artifact and have less explosive starts. We also really want cheap creatures like Skirge (which technically has cmc 2, protecting it from Gorilla Shaman to some degree) because if we land a Drum but don't have any creatures to use it, it is even worse because Shaman might be blowing up our lands. The Krark Clan Shaman is there mostly for elves decks or token decks as it can completely board wipe them frequently. I used to run Elecktrickery, but Elves in particular have some 2 toughness creatures that make a full board clear much better. It is pretty easy to know when to bring in Relic, often for Bonesplitter, and Ancient Grudge is for the mirror usually. There are some matchups where we don't have any board cards, like against Bogles, but I think that racing them in the air and being able to stall on the ground to some degree is also fine. I considered 1 Serene Heart, but it will almost undoubtedly be sided in less than the Hydroblast it replaces, and dealing with Gorilla Shaman is extremely crucial post board.
Any feedback is appreciated, and I will happily answer any questions if you guys have some.
Do those of you testing with the Muller sideboard plan side into it every time? Do you always expect the opponent to have the hate cards? What does standard sideboarding with it look like? The thing I'm worried about is if the opponent has a board clear for the goblins because then it seems like the deck can't win post board if it's only using that plan.
I have some questions about the deck. My list is similar to the maindeck of Martin Muller except I have:
-2 Peer Through the Depths
-1 Goblin Electromancer
-1 SSG
-1 Steam Vents
+1 Remand
+2 Merchant Scroll
+1 Thought Scour
+1 Shivan Reef.
My sideboard is pretty standard too I think, but is very different from Martin's.
2 Angers
1 Dispel
2 Echoing Truth
2 Blood Moon
2 Empty the Warrens
4 Bolt
1 Shattering Spree
1 Shatterstorm
For starters I was wondering about the difference between Pyroclasm and Anger in this deck. Seems like Anger is very relevant against Dredge potentially, but is a bit worse against the hatebears style decks. I'm not sure which is better in an open meta.
2nd. I was wondering whether people tend to favor peer through the depths over merchant scroll or thought scour now. It seems pretty good in the deck, but I'm not sure if it's better than the scroll.
3rd. Are people starting to use the full 8 cost reducers? I remember for a while 7 was the go to number.
Finally, I was wondering if people knew what matchups Shatterstorm is for. I saw it in some lists so I decided to add it to my board, but I never know what matchup it is for (other than affinity). The rest of the sideboard makes sense to me, but I'm not sure if more dispel / swan song type cards are necessary.
I will come back later and tell you what I played and what happened.
In my opinion there are 3 main options here.
1. You put gifts and remand into his hand then untap and cast chalice with x = 2.
2. You put shattering spree and past in flames into his hand then untap and cast chalice with x = 1 leaving up Negate or Mana leak.
3. You put shattering spree and past in flames into his hand, then you untap, play island and leave up 2 counters and potentially thirst EOT if he does nothing.
Now I'll go through each option:
For option 1 you are shutting down a ton of his combo potential. He needs a critical mass of rituals to go off, and chalice on 2 really prevents that. The reason you can't give him shattering spree or past in flames is that he'll obviously just use past in flames and shattering spree to kill chalice because he has the 4 Mana to do that on his turn (if you give him PiF) and you will be tapped out. That is also the risk with this move because if he has a land he can do that anyway by flashing back PiF and then spree to destroy your chalice, a card that can be game winning if you protect it. This makes the play very high risk, because if he does destroy chalice, the remand will be very hard to deal with when he's trying to combo off. The storm deck typically has a fairly low land count, around 18, so he has 13 left out of 42 cards in his deck or hand, but spirebluff comes in tapped so he really has 11 outs which is about 1/4. If he gets the land or already has it you're in a pretty bad spot after his turn. He has 11 outs, but if he can't do anything about it on his next turn you probably win, so it's higher risk, but very high reward.
For option 2 you remove the threat of shattering spree and also all of his cantrips, but you are leaving him available to combo off. However, the mana you have up for countermagic makes it less risky because you can counter a crucial spell to potentially disrupt the combo. He only has 3 other cards in hand so it could be hard for him to storm off through a Negate, and many of his draws are now dead because of chalice shutting down the cantrips. In this case you give him past in flames because you don't want to give him another gifts to potentially cast at the end of your turn which would hurt your plan of holding up counters and would be a real nuisance. This plan is a bit safer than the first option just because it will be very hard for him to punish you severely on his next turn and you successfully slow the game down. It's not as game winning as the first option, and if he has a remand in hand he can likely combo on his next turn, but I think it is still strong. Additionally, echoing truth is a much better card against this strategy.
For option 3 you are basically just playing for the long game. You know that he will have problems going through both counters in a single turn so you are safe from the combo for this turn probably. Additionally, you can probably draw a land with thirst if he doesn't try anything (which is likely because you'll be drawing 3 deep and you'll also have 2 draw steps) so you can maybe just wait and eventually go for the chalice on 2 plan with countermagic backup which would be very hard to stop. This plan is slower, but is very likely to work if your opponent is unable to draw interaction for your counters or force you to tap out and not be able to use thirst. The big problem with this strategy is that your opponent will have a shattering spree, which could make it hard to win with an artifact creature attaching. However, given that a Mindslaver is already in the graveyard, just waiting for academy ruins and going for the lock seems fine because shattering spree is a sorcery.
Overall I think that any of these plans would be solid, but I personally like option 3 the best because I think that it is the hardest to punish. Option 1 really folds to him having a land or naturally drawing another shattering spree, and option 2 can still lose if he draws some remands, an echoing truth for the chalice, or some other piece of artifact hate. Option 3 is just very safe because in 3 more turns (2 more for him) you'll be able to play chalice and likely lock up anyway with Negate backup.
I'm very interested to here what you did Pierakor because this is a very interesting situation and I think any of these options would be a viable choice.
Do people think it is best to run the full 8 Electromancer effects now or is 7 more ideal? Is 8 copies more effective in Merchant Scroll builds because it's easier to find gifts and go off on turn 3? Also, do you folks think that a 2:1 split of Thought Scour and Merchant Scroll would be effective? Just to have access to a 5th Gifts, a 4th Remand or an extra copy of a sideboard card like Dispel or Echoing Truth? Finally, this may be a bit cute but would Peek ever be an effective card to use? Thanks for the advice
What are people's thoughts on Echoing Truth in the sideboard? Is it essential? The reason I ask is because it seems like many of the cards it stops (Grafdigger's Cage, Rest in Peace, Leyline of Sanctity) could also just be defeated by an Empty the Warrens or a Wear // Tear. Do you guys feel that it is absolutely necessary or just useful depending on the meta? Also, I was wondering how proactive people are when boarding in answers to hate cards that they might see. Is it a good idea to sideboard in a card that can kill grave hate or is it better to just leave in combo pieces until you see that the opponent has the grave hate for sure? That's what I think the main advantage of Echoing Truth is over cards that only blow up artifacts or enchantments. It can hit a pesky Scavenging Ooze or attacking creature in a pinch. Is Echoing Truth more effective in decks with Merchant Scroll? Speaking of Merchant Scroll, what is the optimal number to run if you are running them? I would think that one or two would be good, and that way there could still be a Thought Scour or two in the deck (which I think is probably its main competition for that slot.) Then again, I'm not sure if gifts costing the full four mana is really amazing for this deck so maybe Thought Scour is just better as a way to set up for Past in Flames. Scroll seems like a really neat piece of tech so I'm interested to hear how good it is from people that use it. Thanks for the advice!
What are people's thoughts on Mindbreak Trap? I know it's commonly used, I'm just wondering if it's considered a sideboard staple for unknown metas. It seems like one of the few answers to fast combo decks. Can Pyrostatic Pillar help in those matchups from the sideboard or is it too slow? Also, what graveyard hate do people prefer right now. I like Faerie Macabre to be able to interact on the draw turn 1, but I'd like to hear what people think.
I also had some specific questions I was wondering about.
1. Do you guys think 2 Anticipate is too many? Would a Mana Leak, Spell Burst, Thought Knot Seer, or Solemn Simulacrum be better in that slot?
2. Would a Gemstone Caverns be a good substitute for a Ghost Quarter? Just doing the math, the singleton Gemstone is online a very small percentage of the time, and the extra GQ can really help against Tron or manlands (particularly Inkmoth Nexus). GQ is also good with Surgical Extraction post board to take out lands like Tron lands or Valakut. I get that games where Caverns is online are great because I have played with it before, but it seems like too small of a percentage to be very relevant.
3. Are there any key sideboard cards for the new meta that I am missing? I always used to run a Bottle Gnomes in the board, and I am unsure if it is good in this current meta or if the Gnomes are even relevant now compared to Filigree Familiar. Also, is Spreading Seas better against Tron and Valakut than the GQ Surgical Extraction plan?
4. Is running Solemn Simulacrum or Thought Knot Seer better than running a more spell heavy build? There is this constant debate about which is better, and I own both, but I am currently running neither. Would it be worth running 2 copies of one of those creatures? (Probably instead of Cyclonic Rift and 1 Anticipate)
Hi everyone. I had a couple questions that I was hoping you guys could help me with. What matchups is Squelch good against? It seems like such a low impact card and I am just wondering what it is best against. Planeswalker decks? Or maybe just to try and snipe a fetch land? Also, how important is Hurkyl's Recall in the board? Affinity seems like a very bad matchup from my perspective and I was wondering if Hurkyl's even makes that match winnable anyway. It can buy us a turn in my experience but usually not much more. Finally, I was wondering what people think about Spell Snare vs. Spell Pierce vs. Dispel in the board. Which one do you guys prefer? Thanks for the help.
4 Frogmite
4 Myr Enforcer
4 Somber Hoverguard
4 Carapace Forger
2 Vault Skirge
Spells
4 Galvanic Blast
4 Thoughtcast
2 Perilous Research
4 Chromatic Star
4 Springleaf Drum
2 Prophetic Prism
Equipment
4 Flayer Husk
2 Bonesplitter
Lands
4 Darksteel Citadel
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Great Furnace
4 Tree of Tales
4 Ancient Grudge
2 Pyroblast
4 Hydroblast
3 Krark-Clan Shaman
2 Relic of Progenitus
Hey everybody, I've been using this deck for a while and thought I would share my list. I really don't enjoy the fragile nature of the Atog + Fling combo and would much rather play multiple tough threats which is why the combo is not present. I also think that post board it gets much harder to execute the combo, as our artifacts are often being hated on by the opponent. This led me to my more resilient version of the deck.
The cards I added instead of 4 Atog and 2 Fling were 2 Bonesplitter, 2 Vault Skirge, and 2 Perilous Research. I used to have various splits of Skirge and Bonesplitter, without any Researches, but I found that I could not reach a split I liked. Also, lowering the curve of the deck by cutting 6 two mana cards for 6 one mana cards meant that I got flooded more frequently, so Perilous Research was my solution. One main reason I like this version is that there are 4 more artifacts to play on turn 1, which contributes to our nut draws. Vault Skirge is also another early enabler for our Springleaf Drums, a card that needs to be active if we want our occasional turn 2 Myr Enforcer shenanigans. Skirge also holds equipment really well, particularly Bonesplitter, which I added to make all of our Frogmites and other creatures relevant in the lategame if our opponent played a big creature like an Angler. It also helps us establish a clock in the air now that the list includes 6 flyers.
Sideboarding is pretty simple with this deck and usually involves taking out some combination of Research, Skirge, or Splitter. Against red decks we almost always bring in 4 Hydroblast to deal with Gorilla Shaman. This gives us 8 ways to kill it if we include our 4 Galvanic Blast. To make room, I usually side out Research and Splitter because those cards are worse when we can't stick an artifact and have less explosive starts. We also really want cheap creatures like Skirge (which technically has cmc 2, protecting it from Gorilla Shaman to some degree) because if we land a Drum but don't have any creatures to use it, it is even worse because Shaman might be blowing up our lands. The Krark Clan Shaman is there mostly for elves decks or token decks as it can completely board wipe them frequently. I used to run Elecktrickery, but Elves in particular have some 2 toughness creatures that make a full board clear much better. It is pretty easy to know when to bring in Relic, often for Bonesplitter, and Ancient Grudge is for the mirror usually. There are some matchups where we don't have any board cards, like against Bogles, but I think that racing them in the air and being able to stall on the ground to some degree is also fine. I considered 1 Serene Heart, but it will almost undoubtedly be sided in less than the Hydroblast it replaces, and dealing with Gorilla Shaman is extremely crucial post board.
Any feedback is appreciated, and I will happily answer any questions if you guys have some.
-2 Peer Through the Depths
-1 Goblin Electromancer
-1 SSG
-1 Steam Vents
+1 Remand
+2 Merchant Scroll
+1 Thought Scour
+1 Shivan Reef.
My sideboard is pretty standard too I think, but is very different from Martin's.
2 Angers
1 Dispel
2 Echoing Truth
2 Blood Moon
2 Empty the Warrens
4 Bolt
1 Shattering Spree
1 Shatterstorm
For starters I was wondering about the difference between Pyroclasm and Anger in this deck. Seems like Anger is very relevant against Dredge potentially, but is a bit worse against the hatebears style decks. I'm not sure which is better in an open meta.
2nd. I was wondering whether people tend to favor peer through the depths over merchant scroll or thought scour now. It seems pretty good in the deck, but I'm not sure if it's better than the scroll.
3rd. Are people starting to use the full 8 cost reducers? I remember for a while 7 was the go to number.
Finally, I was wondering if people knew what matchups Shatterstorm is for. I saw it in some lists so I decided to add it to my board, but I never know what matchup it is for (other than affinity). The rest of the sideboard makes sense to me, but I'm not sure if more dispel / swan song type cards are necessary.
Thanks for any help.
I really liked your line, made a lot of sense. I considered it in option 1 of my post above, but was debating between the other options.
In my opinion there are 3 main options here.
1. You put gifts and remand into his hand then untap and cast chalice with x = 2.
2. You put shattering spree and past in flames into his hand then untap and cast chalice with x = 1 leaving up Negate or Mana leak.
3. You put shattering spree and past in flames into his hand, then you untap, play island and leave up 2 counters and potentially thirst EOT if he does nothing.
Now I'll go through each option:
For option 1 you are shutting down a ton of his combo potential. He needs a critical mass of rituals to go off, and chalice on 2 really prevents that. The reason you can't give him shattering spree or past in flames is that he'll obviously just use past in flames and shattering spree to kill chalice because he has the 4 Mana to do that on his turn (if you give him PiF) and you will be tapped out. That is also the risk with this move because if he has a land he can do that anyway by flashing back PiF and then spree to destroy your chalice, a card that can be game winning if you protect it. This makes the play very high risk, because if he does destroy chalice, the remand will be very hard to deal with when he's trying to combo off. The storm deck typically has a fairly low land count, around 18, so he has 13 left out of 42 cards in his deck or hand, but spirebluff comes in tapped so he really has 11 outs which is about 1/4. If he gets the land or already has it you're in a pretty bad spot after his turn. He has 11 outs, but if he can't do anything about it on his next turn you probably win, so it's higher risk, but very high reward.
For option 2 you remove the threat of shattering spree and also all of his cantrips, but you are leaving him available to combo off. However, the mana you have up for countermagic makes it less risky because you can counter a crucial spell to potentially disrupt the combo. He only has 3 other cards in hand so it could be hard for him to storm off through a Negate, and many of his draws are now dead because of chalice shutting down the cantrips. In this case you give him past in flames because you don't want to give him another gifts to potentially cast at the end of your turn which would hurt your plan of holding up counters and would be a real nuisance. This plan is a bit safer than the first option just because it will be very hard for him to punish you severely on his next turn and you successfully slow the game down. It's not as game winning as the first option, and if he has a remand in hand he can likely combo on his next turn, but I think it is still strong. Additionally, echoing truth is a much better card against this strategy.
For option 3 you are basically just playing for the long game. You know that he will have problems going through both counters in a single turn so you are safe from the combo for this turn probably. Additionally, you can probably draw a land with thirst if he doesn't try anything (which is likely because you'll be drawing 3 deep and you'll also have 2 draw steps) so you can maybe just wait and eventually go for the chalice on 2 plan with countermagic backup which would be very hard to stop. This plan is slower, but is very likely to work if your opponent is unable to draw interaction for your counters or force you to tap out and not be able to use thirst. The big problem with this strategy is that your opponent will have a shattering spree, which could make it hard to win with an artifact creature attaching. However, given that a Mindslaver is already in the graveyard, just waiting for academy ruins and going for the lock seems fine because shattering spree is a sorcery.
Overall I think that any of these plans would be solid, but I personally like option 3 the best because I think that it is the hardest to punish. Option 1 really folds to him having a land or naturally drawing another shattering spree, and option 2 can still lose if he draws some remands, an echoing truth for the chalice, or some other piece of artifact hate. Option 3 is just very safe because in 3 more turns (2 more for him) you'll be able to play chalice and likely lock up anyway with Negate backup.
I'm very interested to here what you did Pierakor because this is a very interesting situation and I think any of these options would be a viable choice.
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Tower
1 Academy Ruins
1 Oboro, Palace in the Clouds
2 Ghost Quarter
9 Island
Spells
4 Condescend
3 Remand
3 Repeal
2 Anticipate
4 Thirst for Knowledge
2 Spatial Contortion
1 Cyclonic Rift
4 Expedition Map
2 Chalice of the Void
1 Mindslaver
1 Oblivion Stone
Creatures
2 Treasure Mage
1 Snapcaster Mage
2 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Batterskull
1 Platinum Angel
Planeswalkers
1 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
1 Silent Arbiter
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Spellskite
1 Spatial Contortion
3 Dismember
2 Negate
1 Squelch
2 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Dispel
I also had some specific questions I was wondering about.
1. Do you guys think 2 Anticipate is too many? Would a Mana Leak, Spell Burst, Thought Knot Seer, or Solemn Simulacrum be better in that slot?
2. Would a Gemstone Caverns be a good substitute for a Ghost Quarter? Just doing the math, the singleton Gemstone is online a very small percentage of the time, and the extra GQ can really help against Tron or manlands (particularly Inkmoth Nexus). GQ is also good with Surgical Extraction post board to take out lands like Tron lands or Valakut. I get that games where Caverns is online are great because I have played with it before, but it seems like too small of a percentage to be very relevant.
3. Are there any key sideboard cards for the new meta that I am missing? I always used to run a Bottle Gnomes in the board, and I am unsure if it is good in this current meta or if the Gnomes are even relevant now compared to Filigree Familiar. Also, is Spreading Seas better against Tron and Valakut than the GQ Surgical Extraction plan?
4. Is running Solemn Simulacrum or Thought Knot Seer better than running a more spell heavy build? There is this constant debate about which is better, and I own both, but I am currently running neither. Would it be worth running 2 copies of one of those creatures? (Probably instead of Cyclonic Rift and 1 Anticipate)
Any help is appreciated!