Elesh was in the main deck because I built that list after being awake for almost 24 hours on 3 hours of sleep the night before. I wanted to draw / have access to it in as many games as possible to see if it was actually good or not. Not sure I'd play it again. Have a few days to decide before the open this weekend.
Like sticking around after you sacrifice it. No idea why we're going in circles on this. Witness can't evolve into a Resto that blinks said Witness and gives you additional value. It's synergy.
You can evolve witness into Lark though which is infinitely more value and basically better against everything that isn't Burn / Hyper aggro than turning Finks into Resto. These super aggressive decks are already OK matches - so I wouldn't want to play a lack luster card just to try and improve them more.
To be fair, we could say the same for Ruric Thar or Elesh Norn, both are just good in ideal situations where you are actually able to cast or evolution into them.
Not only are they good in ideal situations - they flat out lock people out of the game / win games single handedly. The floor on Ruric Thar is they take 6 damage - which isn't bad in our more aggressive build. The floor on Elesh is wiping most of their creatures away.
The floor on finks is gain 2-4 life.
Are we really making the argument that a top end bomb that wins the game on its own when it hits the field is similar to a 3 drops that generates minimal value even when it is at its best? They are functionally different things.
Courser seems weak to me in an Evo shell. No value upon ETB, free information for the opponent, and a lackluster Evo target as it just dies without leaving anything on the battlefield.
Evolution isn't Birthiing Pod. You have at most four uses of it every game. We have a pile of creatures that generate value with Evolution already. In old Pod lists Finks made sense - after you podded the front half away you wanted a back half to Pod away again.
I don't think anybody is including Finks merely with ideal situations in mind - we're including it because of how good it is in a lot of situations
Like? Again - sell me on the card. So far the only thing close to reasonable for it involves a mana creature living into Evolution on turn three - which is such a great start it doesn't need to be finks to be good. Any creature will do that has value like Wall / Voice / Witness.
Hi Jeff,
I can see the following situations;
Land - 1 Drop - Finks T2. Now we can apply early pressure and we have been able to fetch aggressively.
Land - 1 Drop - Finks T2. Turn 3 Evo - against tapped out opponent we can go for Resto just for a straight reset. We have gained 4 life as well. Against certain opponents we can go straight to a Thragtusk, sigarda, P and K. Any hot sauce you are running
So the argument is that when we have our ideal start (turn 1 dork that lives) it is a passable card?
Don't build decks around ideal situations. Build decks to make less than ideal situations less bad for you. Finks doesn't do this.
You don't **need** something at every spot on the curve. Just because Evo can jump two numbers doesn't mean it has to. Jumping Pia into your 5s is fine if you need it.
Sigarda is another card that isn't great IMO. It often can't block Jund's two drop meaning it cannot race it very well either.
The list of decks you want Magus against that can't Bolt or Clasm it is exactly Infect. Card isn't good in a post Bloom Titan world.
The actual only deck in modern I want finks against because it has a good text box / stats is one drop zoo - which isn't very popular as a whole. The only reason Abzan CoCo plays finks is because it is a combo piece. Not because it lines up well against the modern format.
Courser is probably fine again. I've got one in the latest list that I talked about in my post Baltimore write up.
Honestly - not having awkward ones ofs like Pontif, Glen, and Sin Collector in my deck felt good.
Scapeshift is just a bad matchup. You can play a pile of cards and it will still be bad. In modern that is just how things go - nothing beats everything. I feel like too many people are not willing to write off a matchup in modern. Dodging / hoping to get a bit lucky is a fine plan against a few things if it takes a pile of board cards to skew a matchup to even.
Reading other people's thoughts on Chord is wild. I almost feel like I must be playing a different deck than many posting here. For instance - someone said Eldrazi and Hatebears are bad matchups for this deck - I think they are some of the best possible. You could keep up with Eldrazi when they had Eye and now that they don't you are just a better midrange deck than they are.
Fully believe this is a midrange deck first and a combo deck second. If you are playing it because you think it is a combo deck there are a LOT better choices for comboing in modern that are less clunky than a 4 cost + 5 cost combo that dies to lightning bolt.
The best logic I've seen for Kitchen Finks is "it evolves twice". Which means it is good when you've drawn two copies of evolution. If you draw two copies of evolution - ANY - of your creatures are going to be great. Don't play less than ideal cards to maximize for ideal situations. You want to construct your decks to maximize your ability to gain edges in average situations and even bad ones. Finks just doesn't do this.
I've been pretty unimpressed with Obliteration - I cut it from my 75 in Columbus and didn't miss it. Now that rally as 2 sac outlets it really doesn't do enough. Same thing with ramp having a variety of threats.
Hardest match up is probably RB dragons. They have a lot of "go wide" cards on top of things like flamewake to generate card advantage. Would likely need 2-3 more sweepers to make it a decent matchup, but not sure that is popular enough to be relevant.
Ramp can also be close, but boarding in 4x Transgress makes it pretty reasonable post board.
Disagree that the Rally match up is that difficult. Not counting the match linked above where I missed lethal in 3 different ways the last two turns of the match I am 3-0 against it with BW control between Columbus and Atlanta.
Even counting the match where I was a stone cold idiot I'd be 3-1 against it in sanctioned matches with a good record against it in testing as well.
Don't board in Flaying Tendrils if you have it against Rally. That card is laughable at best against their sea of x/3 creatures.
Interesting. I guess the results are worse, but the YP version seemed to be so promising, especially with Grim Lavamancer.
The 19 land version he used in the first daily was definitely not right. I should think 20 is a minimum, particularly with Tec Edges (which also seemed wrong).
Based on deck lists from daily results here 18-19 lands seems to be the average amount of lands in the 8 cantrip, YP version of UR. They are pretty split on Tecedge VS Mutavault though.
The matches I lost weren't to mana issues. They were largely due to not having enough "action" spells. Deck plays a bunch of cantrips, hurts itself a ton by casting probes and then loses races.
I am pretty sure at this point the Young Pyromancer version of UR is strictly worse than playing Spellstutter in a diverse metagame.
Spellskite is a good idea. Also might consider a mind slaver or two for the side deck.
I like the two black removal because they always work. I hate main decking DB or GTFF and then bumping into something black/artifact and having issues.
I cut the mrys and cathedrals in favor of porcelain legionnaire, but now I might make at least a couple of those spell skites.
If this isn't the floor you board it out. Possible it even belongs in the board to start.
You can evolve witness into Lark though which is infinitely more value and basically better against everything that isn't Burn / Hyper aggro than turning Finks into Resto. These super aggressive decks are already OK matches - so I wouldn't want to play a lack luster card just to try and improve them more.
Not only are they good in ideal situations - they flat out lock people out of the game / win games single handedly. The floor on Ruric Thar is they take 6 damage - which isn't bad in our more aggressive build. The floor on Elesh is wiping most of their creatures away.
The floor on finks is gain 2-4 life.
Are we really making the argument that a top end bomb that wins the game on its own when it hits the field is similar to a 3 drops that generates minimal value even when it is at its best? They are functionally different things.
Evolution isn't Birthiing Pod. You have at most four uses of it every game. We have a pile of creatures that generate value with Evolution already. In old Pod lists Finks made sense - after you podded the front half away you wanted a back half to Pod away again.
Like? Again - sell me on the card. So far the only thing close to reasonable for it involves a mana creature living into Evolution on turn three - which is such a great start it doesn't need to be finks to be good. Any creature will do that has value like Wall / Voice / Witness.
So the argument is that when we have our ideal start (turn 1 dork that lives) it is a passable card?
Don't build decks around ideal situations. Build decks to make less than ideal situations less bad for you. Finks doesn't do this.
Sigarda is another card that isn't great IMO. It often can't block Jund's two drop meaning it cannot race it very well either.
The actual only deck in modern I want finks against because it has a good text box / stats is one drop zoo - which isn't very popular as a whole. The only reason Abzan CoCo plays finks is because it is a combo piece. Not because it lines up well against the modern format.
Honestly - not having awkward ones ofs like Pontif, Glen, and Sin Collector in my deck felt good.
Scapeshift is just a bad matchup. You can play a pile of cards and it will still be bad. In modern that is just how things go - nothing beats everything. I feel like too many people are not willing to write off a matchup in modern. Dodging / hoping to get a bit lucky is a fine plan against a few things if it takes a pile of board cards to skew a matchup to even.
Fully believe this is a midrange deck first and a combo deck second. If you are playing it because you think it is a combo deck there are a LOT better choices for comboing in modern that are less clunky than a 4 cost + 5 cost combo that dies to lightning bolt.
The best logic I've seen for Kitchen Finks is "it evolves twice". Which means it is good when you've drawn two copies of evolution. If you draw two copies of evolution - ANY - of your creatures are going to be great. Don't play less than ideal cards to maximize for ideal situations. You want to construct your decks to maximize your ability to gain edges in average situations and even bad ones. Finks just doesn't do this.
Hardest match up is probably RB dragons. They have a lot of "go wide" cards on top of things like flamewake to generate card advantage. Would likely need 2-3 more sweepers to make it a decent matchup, but not sure that is popular enough to be relevant.
Ramp can also be close, but boarding in 4x Transgress makes it pretty reasonable post board.
Even counting the match where I was a stone cold idiot I'd be 3-1 against it in sanctioned matches with a good record against it in testing as well.
Don't board in Flaying Tendrils if you have it against Rally. That card is laughable at best against their sea of x/3 creatures.
Based on deck lists from daily results here 18-19 lands seems to be the average amount of lands in the 8 cantrip, YP version of UR. They are pretty split on Tecedge VS Mutavault though.
The matches I lost weren't to mana issues. They were largely due to not having enough "action" spells. Deck plays a bunch of cantrips, hurts itself a ton by casting probes and then loses races.
I am pretty sure at this point the Young Pyromancer version of UR is strictly worse than playing Spellstutter in a diverse metagame.
Cheers,
~Jeff
I like the two black removal because they always work. I hate main decking DB or GTFF and then bumping into something black/artifact and having issues.
I cut the mrys and cathedrals in favor of porcelain legionnaire, but now I might make at least a couple of those spell skites.
~Jeff