Obviously Crusader is immune to Go for the Throat as well.
I'm still on the fence about cutting Hawks completely from the deck. While they aren't nearly as great as they were with Batterskull and SoWaP in use, they still have quite a few uses. Ancestral Re(cawing) with Jace, chumping or simply winning games with a flock of evading fliers. However, often you want a more legitimate threat in hand against the major decks of the format, including the mirror. Crusader certainly seems to fill this role, and has several previously mentioned advantages. Someone won a local PTQ with a U/W build sporting a set of them, with several Darkblade and Twin decks in the Top 8.
I don't see how it's that good against Grixis Twin. He costs 3 to play and you have to worry about them flashing in deceiver exarch.
It's also not much better an answer to baby Jace than a hawk is. And Baby Jace is not scary at all (except for the fact that it keeps you off big Jace). It only draws cards and barely affects board.
It is incredible with SoWaP but this is more of a win more situation. A resolved SoWaP on a hawk is deadly as well if generally a turn or two slower in killing them.
I'm not a big fan of the guy in a control shell. He costs too much (taking an expensive place in the curve, doesn't generate any card advantage, and fails the Jace 2.0 test). He's been played before at SCG tournaments (guy was in an article but didn't make top 8). I don't see what really makes him any better in NPH other than having him equipped with a SoWaP being the beatdown (which feels like a win-more card).
In boros, I would definitely want to play 4 of him right now. In caw-blade, I would rather play the hawks (what he's generally replacing) almost all the time.
You don't drop the Crusader out Turn 3 if you're expecting them to combo out and destroy you on Turn 4. That's pretty obvious. He still blanks most of their removal or forces them to blow an Into the Roil on him. You can't afford to not play aggressively with a U/W deck against Twin decks.
Baby Jace indeed 'is' scary, as much as any other planeswalker besides his 4 cmc counterpart. Even if they + him right after dropping him, you're still looking to get very far behind in card advantage and can't use your own Jace to affect the board. That's a pretty big deal in Caw mirrors, and a big reason why most decks are cutting Gideon and running them instead now.
A Hawk certainly isn't close to as fast since you need to factor in the double strike. Especially in Twin or other Caw mirrors where your opponent will likely have alot of cards in hand, multiple SoWaP triggers can instantly kill them if it connects once. At that point the Crusader is immune to everything beyond Jace and Into the Roil.
In the mirror, Darkblade decks will usually tap-out for Emeria Angel as a follow-up to their hand disruption and a way to ignore Spell Pierce and deal with opposing Jaces. U/W wants a card that put early pressure up, and make them pick their poison so to speak with their hand disruption. It's a fine card, and deserves a spot.
If you're still feeling threatened by aggressive decks, you can always run a few Condemns in your sideboard. However, why should you be worried about any deck that Condemn is good against with Batterskull available? Running a second one is good too.
It's really great for straight U/W to fight Darkblade and Grixis Twin decks. It's obviously vulnerable to Jace/ItR but with typical U/W builds you have the luxury of running Spell Pierce to protect him.
It's also a great answer to Caw decks that are running more Jace B's and are stuck facing down a Crusader on the other end of the board after dropping it. It's absolutely incredible with SoWaP and a legitimate threat on it's own.
Misstep is a horrid knee-jerk reaction to the rise of Darkblade and discard effects overall in Standard. It's still a really bad idea to sideboard, much less 'use' in this format. Leyline isn't much better, but Misstep is certainly a pretty bad idea to use too.
It's important to recognize yourself what you want to bring in and out in matchups by taking into account as many factors as possible.
Is your opponent playing lots of creatures, are they aggro? Do they have cards you have difficulty interacting with? Are you the beatdown and need to play aggressively or do you need to assume the control role? What cards were bad in your first game against them or you felt didn't do much? Are you on the play or draw and how might this affect your curve or the strength of cards at different points in the game?
It's not as easy as just writing out a list and copying the boarding card for card whenever you see a specific deck. You'll do a tremendous favor for yourself if you look at sideboarding as a very dynamic aspect of the game. It's not just a simple "this in, this out" whenever you see 'X' card from your opponent.
Just play a Turn 2 Mystic and start wailing on him with a Sword. If he's not interacting with anything but your library it's pretty easy for you to just take control of the game.
I've now cut him and haven't looked back. Batterskull is amazing for the matchups where Gideon is useful too. Jace B and a good removal suite are deterrent enough for most places where Gideon trumps.
My strategy is a bit different with a few more NPH additions to the decklist. I feel like Gitaxian Probe gives a considerable edge on plays where you worry about Spell Pierce, or can capitalize on information. They essentially replace Preordain and fit much better on the curve in the early turns. The only thing I'm way about is cutting the 3rd Pierce, but alot of lists seem to be playing around it anyway. Still keeping a 1-of suite for both baby Jace and Sun Titan, as this list is still geared around combating the mirror.
The sideboard doesn't have anything exciting besides Spellskite, which seems to do well against alot of aggressive decks in the current meta.
I agree that Batterskull fills the role that DoJ or even Gideon by making most non-interactive aggressive strategies fairly awkward.
I don't think a second SoFaF is required any longer, you have alternate routes now that it's not as required to have a backup in the mirror. Playing Sun Titan instead seems reasonable.
I'm not sure about playing 4 Mana Leaks, I think this deck relies too much on it's tempo to play that many. 4 Pierces certainly seems fine if you want to deal with the excess of low-cost walkers.
@jiland
I think Tectonic Edge is too valuable right now to cut from the deck. It shuts down multiple color decks and is invaluable in control m/u's and the mirror. While Inkmoth is awesome, with alot of lists playing Mortarpod and several maindeck Condemns, it loses alot of it's strength.
I also think day of Judgment is losing alot of it's value now, I still have the miser's in the board for those random Birthing Pod/Elves decks that give you fits sometimes without it. But overall I think it's time has passed at least for this deck.
And when your opponent plays Fauna Shaman, Stoneforge Mystic, Lotus Cobra, or anything else above a 1-drop, what do you do then?
This isn't Legacy. People need to stop trying to cram Mental Misstep in every deck because they want to live the dream of countering a Turn 1 Guide.
No Summoning Traps, No Lightning Bolts, No Inferno Titans, Viridian Corrupter mained, Birthing Pod is way out of place here, as is Overgrown Battlement. There's alot of things wrong with this list.
You may as well just dump the Valakuts and build a R/G Birthing Pod aggro deck if you want to do something with this list.
That's a very excellent comparison, I'm glad you brought that up since I hadn't recalled that article in quite some time.
Spellskite does make that contrast rather interesting though. I'd have to designate it Mulldrifter, which makes it all the more enticing to bring into the deck. At worst, I can sideboard it, and maindeck the singletons of Sun Titan and Jace B. again.
I'm still on the fence about cutting Hawks completely from the deck. While they aren't nearly as great as they were with Batterskull and SoWaP in use, they still have quite a few uses. Ancestral Re(cawing) with Jace, chumping or simply winning games with a flock of evading fliers. However, often you want a more legitimate threat in hand against the major decks of the format, including the mirror. Crusader certainly seems to fill this role, and has several previously mentioned advantages. Someone won a local PTQ with a U/W build sporting a set of them, with several Darkblade and Twin decks in the Top 8.
You don't drop the Crusader out Turn 3 if you're expecting them to combo out and destroy you on Turn 4. That's pretty obvious. He still blanks most of their removal or forces them to blow an Into the Roil on him. You can't afford to not play aggressively with a U/W deck against Twin decks.
Baby Jace indeed 'is' scary, as much as any other planeswalker besides his 4 cmc counterpart. Even if they + him right after dropping him, you're still looking to get very far behind in card advantage and can't use your own Jace to affect the board. That's a pretty big deal in Caw mirrors, and a big reason why most decks are cutting Gideon and running them instead now.
A Hawk certainly isn't close to as fast since you need to factor in the double strike. Especially in Twin or other Caw mirrors where your opponent will likely have alot of cards in hand, multiple SoWaP triggers can instantly kill them if it connects once. At that point the Crusader is immune to everything beyond Jace and Into the Roil.
In the mirror, Darkblade decks will usually tap-out for Emeria Angel as a follow-up to their hand disruption and a way to ignore Spell Pierce and deal with opposing Jaces. U/W wants a card that put early pressure up, and make them pick their poison so to speak with their hand disruption. It's a fine card, and deserves a spot.
It's also a great answer to Caw decks that are running more Jace B's and are stuck facing down a Crusader on the other end of the board after dropping it. It's absolutely incredible with SoWaP and a legitimate threat on it's own.
It's important to recognize yourself what you want to bring in and out in matchups by taking into account as many factors as possible.
Is your opponent playing lots of creatures, are they aggro? Do they have cards you have difficulty interacting with? Are you the beatdown and need to play aggressively or do you need to assume the control role? What cards were bad in your first game against them or you felt didn't do much? Are you on the play or draw and how might this affect your curve or the strength of cards at different points in the game?
It's not as easy as just writing out a list and copying the boarding card for card whenever you see a specific deck. You'll do a tremendous favor for yourself if you look at sideboarding as a very dynamic aspect of the game. It's not just a simple "this in, this out" whenever you see 'X' card from your opponent.
He was pumping his Inkmoth Nexus. So no. However, I'm at a loss to why he didn't just redirect the Bolt to the Skite and win.
4 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Sun Titan
1 Jace Beleren
2 Gideon Jura
4 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Batterskull
2 Dismember
2 Gitaxian Probe
1 Into the Roil
3 Mana Leak
1 Mortarpod
3 Preordain
2 Spell Pierce
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
1 Sword of War and Peace
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Island
4 Plains
1 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Scalding Tarn
4 Seachrome Coast
4 Tectonic Edge
2 Celestial Purge
2 Condemn
1 Day of Judgment
2 Divine Offering
3 Flashfreeze
2 Spellskite
2 Kor Firewalker
1 Volition Reins
My strategy is a bit different with a few more NPH additions to the decklist. I feel like Gitaxian Probe gives a considerable edge on plays where you worry about Spell Pierce, or can capitalize on information. They essentially replace Preordain and fit much better on the curve in the early turns. The only thing I'm way about is cutting the 3rd Pierce, but alot of lists seem to be playing around it anyway. Still keeping a 1-of suite for both baby Jace and Sun Titan, as this list is still geared around combating the mirror.
The sideboard doesn't have anything exciting besides Spellskite, which seems to do well against alot of aggressive decks in the current meta.
I agree that Batterskull fills the role that DoJ or even Gideon by making most non-interactive aggressive strategies fairly awkward.
I don't think a second SoFaF is required any longer, you have alternate routes now that it's not as required to have a backup in the mirror. Playing Sun Titan instead seems reasonable.
I'm not sure about playing 4 Mana Leaks, I think this deck relies too much on it's tempo to play that many. 4 Pierces certainly seems fine if you want to deal with the excess of low-cost walkers.
@jiland
I think Tectonic Edge is too valuable right now to cut from the deck. It shuts down multiple color decks and is invaluable in control m/u's and the mirror. While Inkmoth is awesome, with alot of lists playing Mortarpod and several maindeck Condemns, it loses alot of it's strength.
I also think day of Judgment is losing alot of it's value now, I still have the miser's in the board for those random Birthing Pod/Elves decks that give you fits sometimes without it. But overall I think it's time has passed at least for this deck.
Spellskite seems pretty good, though suffers from a syndrome of not being much more than a body and being a very reactive card.
Being able to redirect Splinter Twin, removal, Magnets, and much more seems pretty strong in this format however, and particularly strong in Caw.
Thoughts?
This isn't Legacy. People need to stop trying to cram Mental Misstep in every deck because they want to live the dream of countering a Turn 1 Guide.
No Summoning Traps, No Lightning Bolts, No Inferno Titans, Viridian Corrupter mained, Birthing Pod is way out of place here, as is Overgrown Battlement. There's alot of things wrong with this list.
You may as well just dump the Valakuts and build a R/G Birthing Pod aggro deck if you want to do something with this list.
....Annnnd the previous post's edit reiterates mostly what I was thinking.
Spellskite does make that contrast rather interesting though. I'd have to designate it Mulldrifter, which makes it all the more enticing to bring into the deck. At worst, I can sideboard it, and maindeck the singletons of Sun Titan and Jace B. again.