I 'm testing list for a GP. These are the options I 'm working with:
19 lands, no wraiths, 4 Delver, 2 sleight of hand, no terminates, dismember instead. Deals with the "no flying creatures" and can deal with flying tokens, works well with grave hate. Since we don't have wraiths for losing life (2 more sleight of hand for flipping delver), dismember is in as an enabler for a second turn shadow. The problem it isn't a reliable creature.
19 lands, wraiths, 2 bauble, 1 or 2 tomb stalker -1 taisgur, -1 angler. Bauble to increase the chance to delve tombstalker turn 2. If the plan is go for the midrange, bolt instead of bauble.
So it seems there is a lot of trouble vs DS grixis.
Someone suggested miran crusader. Why not use Auriok Champion? Stop DS, can't be removed even by the list that use bolt, is one mana cheaper and can fit in the burn matchup (yeah I know unlife already kick their asses). Mirran can't kill any of their creatures, the only pro of it is that he can be a win condition.
We can use lingering souls to gain time. 3rd turn or sooner if they discard it.
We must remember that ad nauseam still has a good matchup vs eldrazi tron that is another boogeyman of the format.
While other primers have matchup/SB guides, this thread does not.
Is anyone working on the matchup/SB cheat sheet? While I see a lot of "temur battle rage isn't so good", have you ever tried 1 or 2 Slip Through Space?
Pro: One blue mana, easier to be reused with snap. Unblockable: no interaction with first strike/death touch, it is a cantrip and can be, in desperation, used on your opponents creatures for the draw.
Cons: Sorcery. Doesn't double your damage output (con for tokens, indifferent for midrange).
Grixis shadow feels way better than jund shadow. Sure, Goyf can become 8/9, but with a lot of pushes in the meta, tasigur and angler feels way better and can still be playable vs grave hate.
While kolaghan is good in jund, in grixis with snap it is where it shines.
There is the debate serum(card quality) v Vs sleigh of hand (fast quality), but did we ever consider bauble like jund? 0 mana cost, can be cast during the first turn with seize and wraith filters it.
The downside is card avaliability, if you are digging for a sorcery to win the game bauble may screw you over.
Keeping the format fluid is a burden to players. Sure WOTC want more money, but the player fatigue exists.
It may be cool for you that play only t2, but horrible for those who play modern/legacy/vintage/pauper. I have a skeleton of a mardu deck only for game days and sometimes FNM. There is little to no reason to play t2 since it is way too similar with it's cousin modern. Meaning way too fast.
Sure, It is more expensive but the cards don't rotate, rarely a deck goes down the gutter with a new set (except with bans). call of the herd used to be a strong card. Now it is rare garbage because it is obsolete.
I can see your point being valid since WOTC already burn her customer's by flooding the market with product. (Conspiracy. What a flash in a pan)
"If burn was better" we would see a even more opressive mardu. Saheeli would have even more opressive tools.
So... the problem isn't rdw being weak. The problem is there is little to no downside to play 3/4 color decks in T2.
"So let me get this straight... I get to play all the best early creatures, can transition safe to midrange (heart/gideon) with a flyer, thinking that they last until there, I can use the BEST removals of the game (push/desintegration), I will get recursive treaths and one creature/artifact that won't have to deal with sorc. speed removal? and I may get a litle "oh it's bothersoome this land must come into play tapped because I have three lands in 1 of 50 games that will matter because of 2WW gideon? Ehhh I guess it won't be a problem with new gideon..."
Why play monored when you can deal 3 damage turn two, 6 turn 3 with tool and scraphead? Why play monored if you can transition mid range WHILE having the same aggressiveness and better removals? Inventors apprentice is garbage if you compare to tool.
There is no reason. t2 turned into a warped modern. 3/4 color good stuff. That is hurting the format that should be slow. Time to go back to the colorwheel and hurt the manabase. The problem is that wizards don't wanna print things that hurt mana bases.
I play ANT and belcher as my pet decks in legacy (I have dredge (mana/manaless), ops all spells , BUG, Grixis, Candian, landstill, miracles). I know that sucks to shove in green mana for decay but I still don't see why you have such grudge against Miracles. I can't find a good reason to kill a deck instead of banning other cards of the deck.
A terminus ban would make a better matchup for agro/midrange, tilting the scales. Now with top gone the deck got neutered, maverick and other decks got shafted, and terminus will not be used by anyone. Killing a deck is a resource that should only be used when something is really broken (hulk flash winning T0 during upkeep).
Think that our decks can be the next "Oh noes... we really have to shove in flutterstorm and mind break trap in our sideboard? That is way too much unfun!"
When the majority of pros are saying in chorus with huge part of the players : "That ***** is too strong, unfun and should be banned so we can at least have 3 decks in tier 1" and wizards think it is FINE, we have a really big problem of:
A) They lost all touch with the game and are way more preoccupied with social media.
B) The designers they hired think this is a online game that can be patched with no repercussions ($$).
C) They are being greedy and aren't hiring people to playtest sets.
I guess the answer is all of the above, most prominent is C, see the CRAP printing for the new sets. I used to collect misprint/miscut cards but now misprint are really common. Remembers me of arabian nights printing. Add up to that the box mapping form eldritch moon. I guess they didn't want to pay the algorithm that was used to randomize the cards. Add up to that (getting tired....) the boosters search from MM that had the brilliant idea to use glued paper, a problem that was solved after fallen empires.
Wizards isn't making honest mistakes. You can't call a honests mistakes all that problems that are happening because they aren't allocating resources. This ***** isn't acceptable from a company that is making the same thing over 20 years.
It creates a precedent because the last emergency ban was BEFORE a card was released. Memory jar got removed before it hit anyone. Banning a card out of season because it was a brain fart (really, 2 days amokhet % is okay to ban but all the statistics before that are irrelevant?)
We just saw a ban in legacy of a card that literally destroys a whole deck, a pretty expensive one. After four years. There was no new card interaction that made it broke. In modern they banned golgari grave troll because of other cards, but the deck still is online. Infect? Still works after gitaxian probe, banned because it was too fast.
Miracles four years later: "Well... it is... herm... slow? Yeah, we banned it in extended because it is WAAAYYYY slow. WE totally said it is because of dominance but yeah slow. And that upsets players. Next banlist we will hit : Land destruction, discard, infect, any kind of lock, because it upset the players. We are changing the card layouts and the new creatures are compatible with pokemon cards".
Btw, I own just one saheli. The felidar ban means nothing to me cash wise. I just can't stand a company treating their player base like *****.
So, WHY everyone is pissed of with the change? There is a simple reason, it doesn't look like a magic card at all. Feels more like yugi or spellfire.
1: The text is centered.
2: The card name and type has a disgusting font.
3: The card board has too much noise. "Okay, so we need some stone pillars... and stripes of color...and banners! AND AND A fork thing to hold the holo stamp".
4: Overall the whole card steal way too much attention
from the art. Who is designed this can't be part of MARO team, not from the old team that had the backlash from future sight. Players want MORE art, liking full art cards (see expeditions and full art lands), yet cryptic command feels dull because of the full "Gosh we "need" to do something new for the board, let's just throw things at it" mode they went.
19 lands, no wraiths, 4 Delver, 2 sleight of hand, no terminates, dismember instead. Deals with the "no flying creatures" and can deal with flying tokens, works well with grave hate. Since we don't have wraiths for losing life (2 more sleight of hand for flipping delver), dismember is in as an enabler for a second turn shadow. The problem it isn't a reliable creature.
19 lands, wraiths, 2 bauble, 1 or 2 tomb stalker -1 taisgur, -1 angler. Bauble to increase the chance to delve tombstalker turn 2. If the plan is go for the midrange, bolt instead of bauble.
Someone suggested miran crusader. Why not use Auriok Champion? Stop DS, can't be removed even by the list that use bolt, is one mana cheaper and can fit in the burn matchup (yeah I know unlife already kick their asses). Mirran can't kill any of their creatures, the only pro of it is that he can be a win condition.
We can use lingering souls to gain time. 3rd turn or sooner if they discard it.
We must remember that ad nauseam still has a good matchup vs eldrazi tron that is another boogeyman of the format.
Is anyone working on the matchup/SB cheat sheet? While I see a lot of "temur battle rage isn't so good", have you ever tried 1 or 2 Slip Through Space?
Pro: One blue mana, easier to be reused with snap. Unblockable: no interaction with first strike/death touch, it is a cantrip and can be, in desperation, used on your opponents creatures for the draw.
Cons: Sorcery. Doesn't double your damage output (con for tokens, indifferent for midrange).
While kolaghan is good in jund, in grixis with snap it is where it shines.
There is the debate serum(card quality) v Vs sleigh of hand (fast quality), but did we ever consider bauble like jund? 0 mana cost, can be cast during the first turn with seize and wraith filters it.
The downside is card avaliability, if you are digging for a sorcery to win the game bauble may screw you over.
It may be cool for you that play only t2, but horrible for those who play modern/legacy/vintage/pauper. I have a skeleton of a mardu deck only for game days and sometimes FNM. There is little to no reason to play t2 since it is way too similar with it's cousin modern. Meaning way too fast.
Sure, It is more expensive but the cards don't rotate, rarely a deck goes down the gutter with a new set (except with bans).
call of the herd used to be a strong card. Now it is rare garbage because it is obsolete.
I can see your point being valid since WOTC already burn her customer's by flooding the market with product. (Conspiracy. What a flash in a pan)
So... the problem isn't rdw being weak. The problem is there is little to no downside to play 3/4 color decks in T2.
"So let me get this straight... I get to play all the best early creatures, can transition safe to midrange (heart/gideon) with a flyer, thinking that they last until there, I can use the BEST removals of the game (push/desintegration), I will get recursive treaths and one creature/artifact that won't have to deal with sorc. speed removal? and I may get a litle "oh it's bothersoome this land must come into play tapped because I have three lands in 1 of 50 games that will matter because of 2WW gideon? Ehhh I guess it won't be a problem with new gideon..."
Why play monored when you can deal 3 damage turn two, 6 turn 3 with tool and scraphead? Why play monored if you can transition mid range WHILE having the same aggressiveness and better removals? Inventors apprentice is garbage if you compare to tool.
There is no reason. t2 turned into a warped modern. 3/4 color good stuff. That is hurting the format that should be slow. Time to go back to the colorwheel and hurt the manabase. The problem is that wizards don't wanna print things that hurt mana bases.
Yeah guys... I don't think it was an accident. Better to to look like it was an omission than sheer stupidity.
I play ANT and belcher as my pet decks in legacy (I have dredge (mana/manaless), ops all spells , BUG, Grixis, Candian, landstill, miracles). I know that sucks to shove in green mana for decay but I still don't see why you have such grudge against Miracles. I can't find a good reason to kill a deck instead of banning other cards of the deck.
A terminus ban would make a better matchup for agro/midrange, tilting the scales. Now with top gone the deck got neutered, maverick and other decks got shafted, and terminus will not be used by anyone. Killing a deck is a resource that should only be used when something is really broken (hulk flash winning T0 during upkeep).
Think that our decks can be the next "Oh noes... we really have to shove in flutterstorm and mind break trap in our sideboard? That is way too much unfun!"
A) They lost all touch with the game and are way more preoccupied with social media.
B) The designers they hired think this is a online game that can be patched with no repercussions ($$).
C) They are being greedy and aren't hiring people to playtest sets.
I guess the answer is all of the above, most prominent is C, see the CRAP printing for the new sets. I used to collect misprint/miscut cards but now misprint are really common. Remembers me of arabian nights printing. Add up to that the box mapping form eldritch moon. I guess they didn't want to pay the algorithm that was used to randomize the cards. Add up to that (getting tired....) the boosters search from MM that had the brilliant idea to use glued paper, a problem that was solved after fallen empires.
Wizards isn't making honest mistakes. You can't call a honests mistakes all that problems that are happening because they aren't allocating resources. This ***** isn't acceptable from a company that is making the same thing over 20 years.
It creates a precedent because the last emergency ban was BEFORE a card was released. Memory jar got removed before it hit anyone. Banning a card out of season because it was a brain fart (really, 2 days amokhet % is okay to ban but all the statistics before that are irrelevant?)
We just saw a ban in legacy of a card that literally destroys a whole deck, a pretty expensive one. After four years. There was no new card interaction that made it broke. In modern they banned golgari grave troll because of other cards, but the deck still is online. Infect? Still works after gitaxian probe, banned because it was too fast.
Miracles four years later: "Well... it is... herm... slow? Yeah, we banned it in extended because it is WAAAYYYY slow. WE totally said it is because of dominance but yeah slow. And that upsets players. Next banlist we will hit : Land destruction, discard, infect, any kind of lock, because it upset the players. We are changing the card layouts and the new creatures are compatible with pokemon cards".
Btw, I own just one saheli. The felidar ban means nothing to me cash wise. I just can't stand a company treating their player base like *****.
Oh yeah , we forgot Gideon. He is banned too. Yada yada MOL %.
4 days later:
Sorry guys, Heart of kiran is strong too. Yada yada mol %.
"Hey, look yhis is the new masterpiece fow! Buy boxes !"
Damn. MTG is PC hardware now? Less than a year and your foil card is obsolete!
1: The text is centered.
2: The card name and type has a disgusting font.
3: The card board has too much noise. "Okay, so we need some stone pillars... and stripes of color...and banners! AND AND A fork thing to hold the holo stamp".
4: Overall the whole card steal way too much attention
from the art. Who is designed this can't be part of MARO team, not from the old team that had the backlash from future sight. Players want MORE art, liking full art cards (see expeditions and full art lands), yet cryptic command feels dull because of the full "Gosh we "need" to do something new for the board, let's just throw things at it" mode they went.
"Oh, why not udress?"
"It is already taken."
"Herm... Liliana's duress?"
Infinite name combinations.