so far 8-2-1 over 2 FNMs with this list. Losses and the draw have been to poor/suboptimal play. I love this list it plays well and has game vs so many things. To the surprise of no one, GB really benefited from getting 8 cantrips. Oko is also bonkers with astrolabes. Having Karn means I have even more game vs decks like urza and other artifact heavy decks. Even though i have no way to power out a lattice, the GB shells means when it comes it's always uncontested. Should one day I cut Karn it would be for +1 liliana OTV, +1 oko and +1 something else either tracker or a pulse main.
round 1: GB midrange
g1 I get buried under too many trackers, plain and simple just couldn't keep up. g2 we have an insane back and forth game. I'm talking like one of the best games of magic I've played in a while. the game ended when I top decked karn cast him and fetched/cast lattice. I had 10 lands in play...g3 was much faster just had fast beatdowns, oko to remove opposing goyfs and ripped what I needed when i needed it.
1-0
r2: Humans
g1 I just had a ton of removal and got to flash in a coatl to kill a rider and from there I was so far ahead so I pumped a hexdrinker up to full and went to town. g2 he saw my hand of tons of snakes so played a plague engineer on snake which was good for me as I didn't have any. later I play my own on human and basically prevent him from doing much else. Goyfs take it home
2-0
r3: UW control
g1 we have a long grindy game but I miss-sequence playing oko and could have played oko animate a labe and attack his jace to kill it. instead I did something else stupidly and regretted it immediately. Jace eventually drew him too many cards and I couldn't come back. g2 I mull to 5 and die.
2-1
r4: mono blue tezz whir prison
g1 mega long game and made a mega stupid mistake by elking his ensnaring bridge but ignoring tezzeret, the seeker and attacking him. To be fair there was an insane amount of permanents on the field and just totally forgot about him in my haste to kill him. Well he ults tezz and kills be on back swing. g2 much shorter game. Goyf and killing bridge gets me there easy. g3 we go to time but my deck just preys on his. Had we had a few more minutes I would have had it. what can ya do, that's what I get for making such a bonehead misplay g1.
2-1-1
r5: bant blade
g1 I was able to answer 3 SFM and 2 of the equipment but ultimately couldn't answer the remaining batterskull in time. g2 I get a snake early and with some backup removal and discard snake takes it home. g3 was SUPER long and awesome. We had dueling oko's for a bit. I beat 4 yes 4 SFM and just kept chipping in with coatl and eventually Karn got to lattice lock him. bant blade is such a sweet deck!
3-1-1
t8: UW control rematch.
g1 lots of discard and liliana and oko won me it without too much trouble. g2 was super long and grindy trading back and forth walkers. I'm not sure I played optimally but I eventually got there with a mishmash of things. All I remember is it was close and I never really felt ahead. I feel like had he ripped some sequence of things he could have won. Pretty much most of my cards are must answer tho so there's that.
4-1-1
t4: 4c snow control
g1 we trade coatls back and forth for a while but i was able to sneak in a hexdrinker and pump before he was able to slam his wren6. after getting it to 8 counters I just had to work through some cryptic commands but he was unable to race it in the end. g2 he gets stuck on 3 lands for a few extra turns and that probably shut the door. We trade elks and okos for a while as well but eventually I was able to play too many things. He was doing things but I know he had a couple 4 drops in hand which definitely would have changed the game. I don't think he had a real way to deal with my oko though. still was pretty close all things considering. I'm not sure how many lands he runs but I know decks that tend to have coatl, labe and wren6 tend to shave on lands so it's a thing that happens. While our decks are similar, I think Karn trumps wren6 in this kind of matchup.
5-1-1
Overall super happy with the list and can never complain with a finals finish even though I made some major booboos throughout the night. I want to add in a 3rd oko but unsure what to cut. Obvious choices are hexdrinker or karn. Both tho have been super good for me. 2 of hexdrinker just feels right, card is an insane late game threat. I got to lattice lock people 3 times throughout the night as well and he just finds things I need like pithing needle and explosives on top of liquimetal coating which works insane with oko being able to elk anything like walkers with coating.
Another FNM report with my GB Karnage deck. I was finally able to get a lattice with my winnings. Score. Same list as in the previous post. no changes
r1: izzet phoenix
g1 comes down to me needing to draw removal to stop his dual phoenixes. If I do I'm highly favored to win if I don't I lose. I didn't. g2 hexdrinker followed by a lot of removal/discard and I win. g3 was similar but with relics and goyf beatdowns I took him down no problem. I just played relic as a nihil spellbomb basically. Nothing he could do and eating a card every turn was useless anyways.
1-0
r2 bushwhacker artifacts
In my opinion this list is inferior to the regular 8 whack. It's similar but potentially faster but also more inconsistant. plays things like ornithopters, memnite and signal pest with bomat couriers. G1 I wreck him. g2 I get virtual t3. I was at a real low life and there wasn't anything I could do or draw that could get me outa the swarm. g3 I was able to deal with his big threats aka whackers and pests and a giant goyf and scooze went to town.
2-0
r3 humans
Not much to say. I drew mediocre and never drew much removal and got absoutely curb stomped both games. Neither game was close at all. I drew 2 relics game one and they were just stone dead cards I didn't even have time to crack them. yikes.
2-1
r4 mono red prison
g1 lots of discard and a powered up hexdrinker got me there. g2 was long and drawn out but without lattice I wasn't able to lock him out before he was able to play a karn and lattice me with an SSG on the table facing my lili and karn. Big oof. I did get to have fun with relics and recurring my pithing needle, so that was fun as is liquimetal coating walkers to turn them off. SPeaking of which I got to coating an ensnaring bridge and then fatal push it. THAT was sweet in g1. g3 wasn't very exciting. t1 hexdrinker into 2 goyfs easily won it for me. I had removal for anything he could play. All in all, I was able to deal with Blood moon or it didn't matter. In g3 he had moon but I had 2 basics. Sure I had 3 dead lilianas in hand but it didn't matter. Feels good playing a lot of basics.
3-1
r4 eldrazi tron
ass trophy g1 took him off tron long enough for me to get down a karn and power up a hexdrinker. g2 was a little more exciting I had to beat through a couple eldrazi but eventually I was able to get down karn, get a batterskull and start swinging in. E tron is so much easier than regular tron. I'm still very scared of that. His chalices were mostly irrelevant but I will admit I'm not sure he drew very well.
4-1
top 8: UW control
g1 just tons of discard with a powered up hexdrinker took him down. I was lucky he never drew a walker or D sphere in the 2 critical turns he had before he went to progenitus mode. g2 I drew well and got all the things I needed more or less when I needed them so I had answers to his things. Few discard and then a liliana and I stripped him into top deck mode. Then we battled top cards till I slammed karn and a coating shutting off his walkers. I got to coating + karn + lili sac to kill a teferi so that was also fun. This deck has got to be the most frustrating thing to play against as UW. WHile I hate making people tilt it's hard to feel too bad when they are playing control
5-1
I made some great plays last night and some very poor ones. Had some bad sequences and a couple rookie mistakes so if guys you are are reading this, my bad. Hexdrinker was MVP this week. There were 3 specific times I wished I had the lattice as it would have just been game over. Instead I had to keep playing...1 time losing the other 2 I eventually got there but it should never have been a thing. Thankfully I got one now. I got to do all the things this week with coating shenanigans, relic getting things back from exile. Powered up hexdrinkers and almost ulting lilis. I had a 7/8 goyf at one point vs E. tron. Gosh I love this list. Humans matchup felt awful though. If hogaak gets banned things in my list certainly change but I'm not sure what. I need more mass removal or something vs that deck. I wonder if it's possible to add more basics and play snow things to play dead of winter. If it's possible to consistently have t3 3 damage wrath then that's the way to go. Cry of the carnarium is amazing but it just doesn't cut it vs humans unless I'm lucky. Perhaps trading relics for astrolabs and adding those to SB. This would be post hogaak tho. Cry is too important for that matchup.
Ran Back this list at FNM. Made a few small tweaks. +1 hexdrinker, -1 goyf. In SB +1 kalitas, +1 cry of the carnarium, -1 mycosynth lattice (don't own one and couldn't borrow it, sad) -1 fulminator. The deck didn't disappoint! Felt super good all night.
r1: hardened scales
g1 He has a semi slow start and with enough removal and disruption there was nothing he could do to stop hexdrinker and that raced everything he could throw at me. g2 was similar except I had more removal. Cry of the carnarium was a boss. Card is so good even if it is just -2/-2. I was able to dodge the t2 scales but It wouldn't have mattered much as I had a trophy for it in g2, still tho that deck is scary. MD karn helps a lot tho.
1-0 (2-0)
r2: merfolk
g1 not much to say, lots of removal and disruption and was able to dodge a critical spreading seas preventing him from swinging in for lethal. CHipped in for huge guys until both boards were gummed up. Hexdrinker full powered brought it home. G2 was fun as force of vigor was insane killing on t2 a vial and a spreading seas which was huge as i needed the color fixing. backed by liliana, the last hope combined with karn + batterskull there wasn't much he could do to recover. If I had a lattice, it would have just been game over but what can you do, bskull got me there eventually.
2-0 (4-0)
r3: izzet phoenix
g1 MD relics were huge and a single tireless tracker was able to race a couple phoenix. I ripped a push thanks to the clues and was able to kill one. Close game honestly, If he had found a bolt or something i was probably just dead...probably. g2 more relics shut off his graveyard and I just kept getting discard after discard. I dealt with his t2 TiTi and he wasn't able to do much. Here was a match that featured both goyf and relic together and no, it was never a problem. I use relic when necessary and just save it. I had to blow it once but he was immediately a 3/4 right after. Say what you will, but so far it's not an issue after 12 total matches with this build.
3-0, (6-0)
r4 hogaak
oh boy i was afraid of this match but i have SO much interaction for this match. Long story short, g1 he never drew a hogaak and I was able to get there eventually through hexdrinker and repeatedly killing his *****ters. g2 I find a LOT of interaction and I needed it all. That deck is so insane in it's ability to recover and swarm. good golly. Still tho, I had to assemble an insane amount of everything to get there. IT never felt free or easy but It's no unbeatable. My 1 conclusion from facing this a few times now is, my good hands will always beat their medium hands. I don't think I can ever beat their best but I do have tools to compete. I sure hope hogaak gets banned tho, that card is seriously effed up.
4-0 (8-0)
r5: grixis urza
opponent wanted to do other things so we drew. I wish I had forced him to at least play the match for fun. On paper, it seems really really good for me. With MD karn, relics disruption and removal it seems unbelievably good match. Of course I cannot confirm this. I regret not playing. Oh well.
ID into top 8
t8: hogaak
This was a short match. g1 he rips hogaak off the top on t2 (I inq him t1 to see he has a great hand but 1 land) and cast it (t1 gravecrawler into stitcher combined with my discard and a fetch). Hogaak proceeds to kill me as I didn't see a trophy until too late. He was on 1 mana the whole time. I kill hogaak and by that time he could replay it despite having 1 land. sigh. g2 I have some interaction but his hand was again insane. I have tons of removal and disruption but I never see a creature in like 8-9 turns and die to small chip shots turn after turn. brutal. I think I could have made better mull decisions especially for g1 knowing what I was up against. My medium hands are never going to beat hogaak.
4-1
Over all I love this build. It's so fun, has a great engine in Karn being able to search for things you may need and just having a lot of utility. MD relics are so good in the meta at large and when they aren't good it's an easy 4 cards to board out. It makes SB much easier than before. I'm going to invest in a lattice now. I've tried many variations of Rock builds but this one is my favorite. It fits my personal playstyle but I will admit it's probably not for everyone. GB is in a bad place right now but this angle feels great actually. Hogaak still feels terrible without leylines but we shall see how it shakes out with the upcoming ban announcement in a couple weeks. With good mull decions and decent hands it's beatable.
this all being said, there's certainly room for improvement. Especially for an expected meta. I think I may also cut either 1x fulminator or damping sphere for 1 kalitas. Once hogaak goes away who knows what things will look like
hence going to 3 goyf. You have to realize 3 things:
1) It's my relic, I choose how it's used. It's not like you always have to use it, which people seem to forget. It's like saying scavenging ooze is also a nonbo with goyf when it's proven to not be. There's a solid chunk of matches you just board it out. This is all assuming you even have both pieces together. If you play smart and know how to use it, it's really not an issue.
2) Even if you do pop it, decks like these are meant to fill the yard fast. 1 fetch and a discard and he's a 3/4 again. It's really not hard, I'm surprised I would have to mention this in a GB forum
3) There are matches where goyf doesn't matter at all. Like hogaak. Being able to have relic is far better than a 4/5 goyf especially when you can get back your artifacts from exile with karn. Just as often, he's even bigger as you have other artifacts in the yard.
r1 jund
both games were pretty similar in that We both do a little discard but my things just lined up better. game 1 I land karn on a near empty board but not a ton of mana so I grab batterskull and that takes it home. g2 he just floods a bit at the end and a hexdrinker got there after funneling mana into it little by little holding up removal.
1-0
r2 hogaak
this was vs endboss Sky Mason who, spoiler alert, beat me relatively soundly even though in 2 games I went, t1 relic, t2 scooze and still lost. g1 he just went super wide and couldn't stop that. g2 i flooded out at the end. if I had a mass removal spell of some kind I think I would have been ok. I was able to always answer the gaak but I could never find what I needed to stop the army of idiots.
1-1
r3 UW control
g1 i have discard into is awkward hand of nothing relevant and 2 cryptics and a verdict. Land a goyf and then karn and I start coating all his lands away. g2 we both mull to 5 but I have a decent hand just need a black. Well I luck rip a swamp off the top and double discard him. land a hexdrinker and go to town. easy as that.
2-1
r4 abzan
game 1 i have relic to deal with souls and goyf beatdowns with removal get me there easily. G2 he has endless siege rhinos combined with new sorin. g3 I make a mega bonehead lines of play. I have 2 options, go all aboard the hexdrinker plan and then play karn later or leave hexdrinker as a 2/1 and play karn and start coating away his lands seeing as he doesn't have great mana right now. Well I choose the greed play with karn and get so very punished. I knew as soon as I got the coating it was the wrong play. If i just level the drinker to a 4/4 there's literally nothing he can do about it. let alone getting it to a 6/6 which I could have done the next turn and won easily as I would have still had a karn. It was very embarrassing. I tried to get cute, it's my first time playing this, leave me alone haha
2-2*
r5 infect
both games went as such. Lots of discard and removal. g1 I killed him with liliana TLH and treetop villages, g2 it was karn into lattice on a clear board.
3-2
the deck felt great honestly. Got buried by hogaak which just proves how ridiculous the deck is but 1 shot GY things obviously don't cut it. I do think with some tweaks I can make it not bad tho. I'm going to add a flaying tendrils an that should help in the SB. Main I'm going to: -1 goyf +1 hexdrinker. I didn't have high hopes with this deck going into the tourney but the deck performed so much better than I thought. I have no idea how I beat something like mono red phoenix but can't prepare for everything. I doubt having a witchbane orb is going to fix that. maybe? I think I'm going to make those tweaks and run it back, it was certainly a fun take on GB even though I don't think it's by any means a top build.
@Tears of Tomorrow (post EU) I apologize if this is going to be overly negative but I'll do my best to be constructive here. There are quite a few competing issues here with this deck. Firstly, you have a few different and competing strategies going on here. You have a bunch of mana dorks but the only thing you are ramping into is liliana who, by herself, is not modern playable (although I would love to be proven wrong). She barely impacts the board, and takes way too long to really do much. I can see her in a meta of just pure grindy midrange but that's just not modern. If you are able to ramp and play a 6 drop there are much better things you can be doing. You will want something that's just going to straight win you the game right then and there or in a turn or 2. Modern is brutal and efficient and you need to be as well.
secondly, smallpox is great! I love the card but not in a deck filled with creatures. Like, t1 you cast birds then t2 do you cast smallpox? that seems horrible. You will want a deck that can maximize the ability yet not have it impact you that much. I find it hard to believe you can ramp into your payoff card (liliana) when you are killing your own guys and lands. On that, 20 lands is probably not enough, you will need at least 2-3 more. There's no way you can reliably cast a 6 drop if you have priest and smallpox working against you. I do get that priest and 2 mana dorks is some cool ramp so I'm sure that will happen but if they have an answer you are just done for.
Another problem is the creature selection. You have no pressure at all with this list. If you go by modern being a t4 format, what turn does your deck typically kill on? Yes, most of these cards do attack but they are so weak and just get outclassed by everything in the format. An easy exchange would be llanowar elves for noble heirarch, it's strictly better in every way. You also have no way to recur a crawler unless you have liliana or a dead dissenter or another crawler. Priest is an interesting inclusion and I like that card but you have to build around it. Currently, you just don't have enough to maximize it's value, it's almost negative synergy. I would lean more heavily into it. We now have nether spirit and of course trusty bloodghast. Another issue with the ramp plan is you have no way of finding your payoff cards and no mana sinks at all. What makes tron such an effective ramp deck is it just has so many ways to find it's payoff cards and it's ramp, you rarely get stuck with one half or the other. You will find many scenarios you are drawing mana dorks and nothing to do with all your mana or the other way around.
next to the mana. I think it is fine overall but you need more blooming marsh. That's an easy pain free way to have t1 black or green which is oh so important. You need some manlands in here of some kind. Smallpox and priest are boosted so much by manlands and provide a decent mana sink later. You are also going to need nurturing peatland. You need the card advantage desperately. I'm not convinced 20 lands is enough. If you are having trouble with tron which I imagine you would, I think 1-2 field of ruin could help. Plus they help in other matches and killing utility lands is pretty huge which is not a guarantee with smallpox.
Sideboard. I wouldn't bother with putrefy. Abrupt decay is better. Between trophy and decay you don't need that card. Also, play 4 leyline. It's only good on t0 which you want the best chances of seeing and not having to mull into oblivion to find it. I think an easy swap is 4 leyline, 3 surgical. There's a bunch of different avenues you can go with SB. Smallpox and priest kinda hinder your ability to use some of the utility creatures. If this works for you than no need to get fancy.
I hope there's something here to help you in this long rambling post
I think it's fine. Has applications vs many other problematic decks. To hogaak specifically, there are certain (and usually not uncommon) scenarios where they can rebuild super easily or it would do just about nothing. Like, in response they sac some dudes and lose their tokens and that's about it. Perhaps that's enough if you have pressure. Like if they have a feeder on board already it's not going to do much with their recursive threats.
well sadly this deck got nothing from horizons really but I just got these at GP Providence. looks like I need to put down my other deck and play this for a while.
this card seems like a solid late game mana sink. Probably too slow depending on the expected meta but for grindy matches this could be great. I love that is is colorless mana to level. That's pretty huge. High risk, high reward, kinda card. Maybe?
We needed more Doran effects but huatli is really disappointing. She costs more than assault and is easier to deal with. Gaining life is great and all but she doesn't really do anything. She seems good as a sb option tho. If she had a plus then I'd be more excited by her. Formation is just better in every way. Spending your t3 to play her and gain 4ish life seems really bad
vraska is not good. What archetypes do you want her against? How is she helping bad matches? Her card draw is at a serious early game disadvantage. You don't have expendable permanents. Yes against grindy she can be good late game but still, it still takes a stalled board for her to really shine. If she's just a t4 abrupt decay you can do so much better. Her ultimate isn't even a guaranteed win either.
The best way to sum up vraska is she doesn't even see play in standard...
he sure can, I'm pretty sure there's another thread out there with zur and doran. I like those lists. I may revist now that we have cards like deputy and dive down. lot of strong things goin on with esper colors.
What does your meta look like? I can totally get onboard with evolution, I used to play that card a while back and always loved it although in a very different deck. The problem I have with it in this deck is you are saccing very important creatures in order to not necessarily win. Saccing a bird is totally legit but I have found a lot that this deck runs out of threats fast and having to kill your own guys in order to get another seems suboptimal at best. My meta is pretty hostile to Doran at the moment, lots of GBx and combo. I'm curious as to what yours is that you can afford to do this. I have struggled so heavily in a removal heavy meta. Or I just lose to the combo decks before I can even apply proper pressure outside the nut draws. The biggest issue with Doran is it's essentially a fair combo deck on it's own with very little interaction.
"I'll also go from a Harbinger to a dork to get my colors for my next turn, and the reverse to fix my lands for future turns. Even a Harbinger to a Harbinger to fetch another land or get a backup Doran as my next draw if I think removal for one on the battlefield is coming. It is a really versatile spell." what decks are you facing where this is a real line you can afford to take? How are you just not dead if you are using evolutions to get a mana dork or harbinger?
The red splash is interesting tho. How has rhythm been? It doesn't seems very strong in this archetype. Seems like a solid SB card tho.
2 hexdrinker
2 scavenging ooze
4 ice-fang coatl
4 tarmogoyf
spells
4 arcum's astrolabe
4 fatal push
4 inquisition of kozilek
2 thoughtseize
3 assassin's trophy
2 liliana of the veil
1 liliana, the last hope
2 oko, thief of crowns
3 karn, the great creator
2 blooming marsh
3 field of ruin
2 nurturing peatland
1 breeding pool
1 overgrown tomb
1 watery grave
2 snow-covered forest
1 snow-covered island
4 snow-covered swamp
2 prismatic vista
4 verdant catacombs
2 fulminator mage
1 plague engineer
1 kalitas, traitor of ghet
1 engineered explosives
1 grafdigger's cage
1 pithing needle
1 liquimetal coating
1 torpor orb
2 dead of winter
1 maelstrom pulse
1 force of vigor
1 batterskull
1 mycosynth lattice
round 1: GB midrange
g1 I get buried under too many trackers, plain and simple just couldn't keep up. g2 we have an insane back and forth game. I'm talking like one of the best games of magic I've played in a while. the game ended when I top decked karn cast him and fetched/cast lattice. I had 10 lands in play...g3 was much faster just had fast beatdowns, oko to remove opposing goyfs and ripped what I needed when i needed it.
1-0
r2: Humans
g1 I just had a ton of removal and got to flash in a coatl to kill a rider and from there I was so far ahead so I pumped a hexdrinker up to full and went to town. g2 he saw my hand of tons of snakes so played a plague engineer on snake which was good for me as I didn't have any. later I play my own on human and basically prevent him from doing much else. Goyfs take it home
2-0
r3: UW control
g1 we have a long grindy game but I miss-sequence playing oko and could have played oko animate a labe and attack his jace to kill it. instead I did something else stupidly and regretted it immediately. Jace eventually drew him too many cards and I couldn't come back. g2 I mull to 5 and die.
2-1
r4: mono blue tezz whir prison
g1 mega long game and made a mega stupid mistake by elking his ensnaring bridge but ignoring tezzeret, the seeker and attacking him. To be fair there was an insane amount of permanents on the field and just totally forgot about him in my haste to kill him. Well he ults tezz and kills be on back swing. g2 much shorter game. Goyf and killing bridge gets me there easy. g3 we go to time but my deck just preys on his. Had we had a few more minutes I would have had it. what can ya do, that's what I get for making such a bonehead misplay g1.
2-1-1
r5: bant blade
g1 I was able to answer 3 SFM and 2 of the equipment but ultimately couldn't answer the remaining batterskull in time. g2 I get a snake early and with some backup removal and discard snake takes it home. g3 was SUPER long and awesome. We had dueling oko's for a bit. I beat 4 yes 4 SFM and just kept chipping in with coatl and eventually Karn got to lattice lock him. bant blade is such a sweet deck!
3-1-1
t8: UW control rematch.
g1 lots of discard and liliana and oko won me it without too much trouble. g2 was super long and grindy trading back and forth walkers. I'm not sure I played optimally but I eventually got there with a mishmash of things. All I remember is it was close and I never really felt ahead. I feel like had he ripped some sequence of things he could have won. Pretty much most of my cards are must answer tho so there's that.
4-1-1
t4: 4c snow control
g1 we trade coatls back and forth for a while but i was able to sneak in a hexdrinker and pump before he was able to slam his wren6. after getting it to 8 counters I just had to work through some cryptic commands but he was unable to race it in the end. g2 he gets stuck on 3 lands for a few extra turns and that probably shut the door. We trade elks and okos for a while as well but eventually I was able to play too many things. He was doing things but I know he had a couple 4 drops in hand which definitely would have changed the game. I don't think he had a real way to deal with my oko though. still was pretty close all things considering. I'm not sure how many lands he runs but I know decks that tend to have coatl, labe and wren6 tend to shave on lands so it's a thing that happens. While our decks are similar, I think Karn trumps wren6 in this kind of matchup.
5-1-1
Overall super happy with the list and can never complain with a finals finish even though I made some major booboos throughout the night. I want to add in a 3rd oko but unsure what to cut. Obvious choices are hexdrinker or karn. Both tho have been super good for me. 2 of hexdrinker just feels right, card is an insane late game threat. I got to lattice lock people 3 times throughout the night as well and he just finds things I need like pithing needle and explosives on top of liquimetal coating which works insane with oko being able to elk anything like walkers with coating.
g1 comes down to me needing to draw removal to stop his dual phoenixes. If I do I'm highly favored to win if I don't I lose. I didn't. g2 hexdrinker followed by a lot of removal/discard and I win. g3 was similar but with relics and goyf beatdowns I took him down no problem. I just played relic as a nihil spellbomb basically. Nothing he could do and eating a card every turn was useless anyways.
1-0
r2 bushwhacker artifacts
In my opinion this list is inferior to the regular 8 whack. It's similar but potentially faster but also more inconsistant. plays things like ornithopters, memnite and signal pest with bomat couriers. G1 I wreck him. g2 I get virtual t3. I was at a real low life and there wasn't anything I could do or draw that could get me outa the swarm. g3 I was able to deal with his big threats aka whackers and pests and a giant goyf and scooze went to town.
2-0
r3 humans
Not much to say. I drew mediocre and never drew much removal and got absoutely curb stomped both games. Neither game was close at all. I drew 2 relics game one and they were just stone dead cards I didn't even have time to crack them. yikes.
2-1
r4 mono red prison
g1 lots of discard and a powered up hexdrinker got me there. g2 was long and drawn out but without lattice I wasn't able to lock him out before he was able to play a karn and lattice me with an SSG on the table facing my lili and karn. Big oof. I did get to have fun with relics and recurring my pithing needle, so that was fun as is liquimetal coating walkers to turn them off. SPeaking of which I got to coating an ensnaring bridge and then fatal push it. THAT was sweet in g1. g3 wasn't very exciting. t1 hexdrinker into 2 goyfs easily won it for me. I had removal for anything he could play. All in all, I was able to deal with Blood moon or it didn't matter. In g3 he had moon but I had 2 basics. Sure I had 3 dead lilianas in hand but it didn't matter. Feels good playing a lot of basics.
3-1
r4 eldrazi tron
ass trophy g1 took him off tron long enough for me to get down a karn and power up a hexdrinker. g2 was a little more exciting I had to beat through a couple eldrazi but eventually I was able to get down karn, get a batterskull and start swinging in. E tron is so much easier than regular tron. I'm still very scared of that. His chalices were mostly irrelevant but I will admit I'm not sure he drew very well.
4-1
top 8: UW control
g1 just tons of discard with a powered up hexdrinker took him down. I was lucky he never drew a walker or D sphere in the 2 critical turns he had before he went to progenitus mode. g2 I drew well and got all the things I needed more or less when I needed them so I had answers to his things. Few discard and then a liliana and I stripped him into top deck mode. Then we battled top cards till I slammed karn and a coating shutting off his walkers. I got to coating + karn + lili sac to kill a teferi so that was also fun. This deck has got to be the most frustrating thing to play against as UW. WHile I hate making people tilt it's hard to feel too bad when they are playing control
5-1
I made some great plays last night and some very poor ones. Had some bad sequences and a couple rookie mistakes so if guys you are are reading this, my bad. Hexdrinker was MVP this week. There were 3 specific times I wished I had the lattice as it would have just been game over. Instead I had to keep playing...1 time losing the other 2 I eventually got there but it should never have been a thing. Thankfully I got one now. I got to do all the things this week with coating shenanigans, relic getting things back from exile. Powered up hexdrinkers and almost ulting lilis. I had a 7/8 goyf at one point vs E. tron. Gosh I love this list. Humans matchup felt awful though. If hogaak gets banned things in my list certainly change but I'm not sure what. I need more mass removal or something vs that deck. I wonder if it's possible to add more basics and play snow things to play dead of winter. If it's possible to consistently have t3 3 damage wrath then that's the way to go. Cry of the carnarium is amazing but it just doesn't cut it vs humans unless I'm lucky. Perhaps trading relics for astrolabs and adding those to SB. This would be post hogaak tho. Cry is too important for that matchup.
3 hexdrinker
2 scavenging ooze
3 tarmogoyf
2 tireless tracker
spells
4 fatal push
4 inquisition of kozilek
3 thoughtseize
3 assassin's trophy
4 relic of progenitus
walkers
3 liliana of the veil
1 liliana, the last hope
4 karn, the great creator
1 blast zone
3 field of ruin
3 blooming marsh
1 hissing quagmire
2 treetop village
2 nurturing peatland
2 overgrown tomb
2 forest
4 swamp
4 verdant catacombs
1 fulminator mage
1 Kalitas, traitor of ghet
2 plague engineer
1 damnation
1 maelstrom pulse
1 force of vigor
1 batterskull
1 cry of the carnarium
1 liquimetal coating
1 pithing needle
2 damping sphere
1 grafdigger's cage
1 engineered explosives
g1 He has a semi slow start and with enough removal and disruption there was nothing he could do to stop hexdrinker and that raced everything he could throw at me. g2 was similar except I had more removal. Cry of the carnarium was a boss. Card is so good even if it is just -2/-2. I was able to dodge the t2 scales but It wouldn't have mattered much as I had a trophy for it in g2, still tho that deck is scary. MD karn helps a lot tho.
1-0 (2-0)
r2: merfolk
g1 not much to say, lots of removal and disruption and was able to dodge a critical spreading seas preventing him from swinging in for lethal. CHipped in for huge guys until both boards were gummed up. Hexdrinker full powered brought it home. G2 was fun as force of vigor was insane killing on t2 a vial and a spreading seas which was huge as i needed the color fixing. backed by liliana, the last hope combined with karn + batterskull there wasn't much he could do to recover. If I had a lattice, it would have just been game over but what can you do, bskull got me there eventually.
2-0 (4-0)
r3: izzet phoenix
g1 MD relics were huge and a single tireless tracker was able to race a couple phoenix. I ripped a push thanks to the clues and was able to kill one. Close game honestly, If he had found a bolt or something i was probably just dead...probably. g2 more relics shut off his graveyard and I just kept getting discard after discard. I dealt with his t2 TiTi and he wasn't able to do much. Here was a match that featured both goyf and relic together and no, it was never a problem. I use relic when necessary and just save it. I had to blow it once but he was immediately a 3/4 right after. Say what you will, but so far it's not an issue after 12 total matches with this build.
3-0, (6-0)
r4 hogaak
oh boy i was afraid of this match but i have SO much interaction for this match. Long story short, g1 he never drew a hogaak and I was able to get there eventually through hexdrinker and repeatedly killing his *****ters. g2 I find a LOT of interaction and I needed it all. That deck is so insane in it's ability to recover and swarm. good golly. Still tho, I had to assemble an insane amount of everything to get there. IT never felt free or easy but It's no unbeatable. My 1 conclusion from facing this a few times now is, my good hands will always beat their medium hands. I don't think I can ever beat their best but I do have tools to compete. I sure hope hogaak gets banned tho, that card is seriously effed up.
4-0 (8-0)
r5: grixis urza
opponent wanted to do other things so we drew. I wish I had forced him to at least play the match for fun. On paper, it seems really really good for me. With MD karn, relics disruption and removal it seems unbelievably good match. Of course I cannot confirm this. I regret not playing. Oh well.
ID into top 8
t8: hogaak
This was a short match. g1 he rips hogaak off the top on t2 (I inq him t1 to see he has a great hand but 1 land) and cast it (t1 gravecrawler into stitcher combined with my discard and a fetch). Hogaak proceeds to kill me as I didn't see a trophy until too late. He was on 1 mana the whole time. I kill hogaak and by that time he could replay it despite having 1 land. sigh. g2 I have some interaction but his hand was again insane. I have tons of removal and disruption but I never see a creature in like 8-9 turns and die to small chip shots turn after turn. brutal. I think I could have made better mull decisions especially for g1 knowing what I was up against. My medium hands are never going to beat hogaak.
4-1
Over all I love this build. It's so fun, has a great engine in Karn being able to search for things you may need and just having a lot of utility. MD relics are so good in the meta at large and when they aren't good it's an easy 4 cards to board out. It makes SB much easier than before. I'm going to invest in a lattice now. I've tried many variations of Rock builds but this one is my favorite. It fits my personal playstyle but I will admit it's probably not for everyone. GB is in a bad place right now but this angle feels great actually. Hogaak still feels terrible without leylines but we shall see how it shakes out with the upcoming ban announcement in a couple weeks. With good mull decions and decent hands it's beatable.
1) It's my relic, I choose how it's used. It's not like you always have to use it, which people seem to forget. It's like saying scavenging ooze is also a nonbo with goyf when it's proven to not be. There's a solid chunk of matches you just board it out. This is all assuming you even have both pieces together. If you play smart and know how to use it, it's really not an issue.
2) Even if you do pop it, decks like these are meant to fill the yard fast. 1 fetch and a discard and he's a 3/4 again. It's really not hard, I'm surprised I would have to mention this in a GB forum
3) There are matches where goyf doesn't matter at all. Like hogaak. Being able to have relic is far better than a 4/5 goyf especially when you can get back your artifacts from exile with karn. Just as often, he's even bigger as you have other artifacts in the yard.
2 hexdrinker
2 scavenging ooze
4 tarmogoyf
2 tireless tracker
spells
4 fatal push
4 inquisition of kozilek
3 thoughtseize
3 assassin's trophy
4 relic of progenitus
walkers
3 liliana of the veil
1 liliana, the last hope
4 karn, the great creator
1 blast zone
3 field of ruin
3 blooming marsh
1 hissing quagmire
2 treetop village
2 nurturing peatland
2 overgrown tomb
2 forest
4 swamp
4 verdant catacombs
2 fulminator mage
2 plague engineer
1 damnation
1 maelstrom pulse
1 force of vigor
1 batterskull
1 mycosynth lattice
1 liquimetal coating
1 pithing needle
2 damping sphere
1 grafdigger's cage
1 engineered explosives
r1 jund
both games were pretty similar in that We both do a little discard but my things just lined up better. game 1 I land karn on a near empty board but not a ton of mana so I grab batterskull and that takes it home. g2 he just floods a bit at the end and a hexdrinker got there after funneling mana into it little by little holding up removal.
1-0
r2 hogaak
this was vs endboss Sky Mason who, spoiler alert, beat me relatively soundly even though in 2 games I went, t1 relic, t2 scooze and still lost. g1 he just went super wide and couldn't stop that. g2 i flooded out at the end. if I had a mass removal spell of some kind I think I would have been ok. I was able to always answer the gaak but I could never find what I needed to stop the army of idiots.
1-1
r3 UW control
g1 i have discard into is awkward hand of nothing relevant and 2 cryptics and a verdict. Land a goyf and then karn and I start coating all his lands away. g2 we both mull to 5 but I have a decent hand just need a black. Well I luck rip a swamp off the top and double discard him. land a hexdrinker and go to town. easy as that.
2-1
r4 abzan
game 1 i have relic to deal with souls and goyf beatdowns with removal get me there easily. G2 he has endless siege rhinos combined with new sorin. g3 I make a mega bonehead lines of play. I have 2 options, go all aboard the hexdrinker plan and then play karn later or leave hexdrinker as a 2/1 and play karn and start coating away his lands seeing as he doesn't have great mana right now. Well I choose the greed play with karn and get so very punished. I knew as soon as I got the coating it was the wrong play. If i just level the drinker to a 4/4 there's literally nothing he can do about it. let alone getting it to a 6/6 which I could have done the next turn and won easily as I would have still had a karn. It was very embarrassing. I tried to get cute, it's my first time playing this, leave me alone haha
2-2*
r5 infect
both games went as such. Lots of discard and removal. g1 I killed him with liliana TLH and treetop villages, g2 it was karn into lattice on a clear board.
3-2
the deck felt great honestly. Got buried by hogaak which just proves how ridiculous the deck is but 1 shot GY things obviously don't cut it. I do think with some tweaks I can make it not bad tho. I'm going to add a flaying tendrils an that should help in the SB. Main I'm going to: -1 goyf +1 hexdrinker. I didn't have high hopes with this deck going into the tourney but the deck performed so much better than I thought. I have no idea how I beat something like mono red phoenix but can't prepare for everything. I doubt having a witchbane orb is going to fix that. maybe? I think I'm going to make those tweaks and run it back, it was certainly a fun take on GB even though I don't think it's by any means a top build.
secondly, smallpox is great! I love the card but not in a deck filled with creatures. Like, t1 you cast birds then t2 do you cast smallpox? that seems horrible. You will want a deck that can maximize the ability yet not have it impact you that much. I find it hard to believe you can ramp into your payoff card (liliana) when you are killing your own guys and lands. On that, 20 lands is probably not enough, you will need at least 2-3 more. There's no way you can reliably cast a 6 drop if you have priest and smallpox working against you. I do get that priest and 2 mana dorks is some cool ramp so I'm sure that will happen but if they have an answer you are just done for.
Another problem is the creature selection. You have no pressure at all with this list. If you go by modern being a t4 format, what turn does your deck typically kill on? Yes, most of these cards do attack but they are so weak and just get outclassed by everything in the format. An easy exchange would be llanowar elves for noble heirarch, it's strictly better in every way. You also have no way to recur a crawler unless you have liliana or a dead dissenter or another crawler. Priest is an interesting inclusion and I like that card but you have to build around it. Currently, you just don't have enough to maximize it's value, it's almost negative synergy. I would lean more heavily into it. We now have nether spirit and of course trusty bloodghast. Another issue with the ramp plan is you have no way of finding your payoff cards and no mana sinks at all. What makes tron such an effective ramp deck is it just has so many ways to find it's payoff cards and it's ramp, you rarely get stuck with one half or the other. You will find many scenarios you are drawing mana dorks and nothing to do with all your mana or the other way around.
next to the mana. I think it is fine overall but you need more blooming marsh. That's an easy pain free way to have t1 black or green which is oh so important. You need some manlands in here of some kind. Smallpox and priest are boosted so much by manlands and provide a decent mana sink later. You are also going to need nurturing peatland. You need the card advantage desperately. I'm not convinced 20 lands is enough. If you are having trouble with tron which I imagine you would, I think 1-2 field of ruin could help. Plus they help in other matches and killing utility lands is pretty huge which is not a guarantee with smallpox.
Sideboard. I wouldn't bother with putrefy. Abrupt decay is better. Between trophy and decay you don't need that card. Also, play 4 leyline. It's only good on t0 which you want the best chances of seeing and not having to mull into oblivion to find it. I think an easy swap is 4 leyline, 3 surgical. There's a bunch of different avenues you can go with SB. Smallpox and priest kinda hinder your ability to use some of the utility creatures. If this works for you than no need to get fancy.
I hope there's something here to help you in this long rambling post
The best way to sum up vraska is she doesn't even see play in standard...
"I'll also go from a Harbinger to a dork to get my colors for my next turn, and the reverse to fix my lands for future turns. Even a Harbinger to a Harbinger to fetch another land or get a backup Doran as my next draw if I think removal for one on the battlefield is coming. It is a really versatile spell." what decks are you facing where this is a real line you can afford to take? How are you just not dead if you are using evolutions to get a mana dork or harbinger?
The red splash is interesting tho. How has rhythm been? It doesn't seems very strong in this archetype. Seems like a solid SB card tho.