MTG Salvation

Yeah, boros picked up suddenly around the time I made this list. I think there are a few things going into that. Firstly, they seem to be playing less journey to nowhere than before, which makes baneslayer excellent against them after sideboarding. Many of their draws that deal a lot of damage to you don't disrupt you, so before the games would go like this:

t1 I play Birds of Paradise, opponent plays steppe lynx
t2 I play cobra and a tapped land and pass, opponent plays fetchland, geopede, attack for 4
t3 I play land, baneslayer, opponent journeys the BSA, plays another fetchland and attacks for 9. I'm now basically dead unless I have a 2nd BSA.

Whereas now the t3 baneslayer sticks. It could definately be small numbers, and a 'genuine' percentage would probably only be around 50-60% now, but I think its more about the changes to their lists. I'm also being hit by fewer game 1 sparkmages, which is massive.

On my side, I am main-decking linvala, I tutor it pre-emptively more often, and I'm remembering to keep in linvala after sideboarding (I used to forget to bring it in). Garruk is pretty good agianst them too because their creatures are quite big; you block one big guy with the 3/3, and another goes after garruk, and so you gained 6-10 life and in general forced them to crack another fetchland. If they ignore garruk, you can quickly out-tempo them. And of course, I'm generally getting better at choosing when to chump with hawk, when to chump with vengevine, when to turn the tables and become aggressive, etc., as I get more practice. This is one of the most skill-intesive and decision-intensive match-ups in my opinion, because of all the combat math and guesswork on which creatures/removal they have.

Overall, its just multiple changes having a large impact. I'm not scared of boros at all now.

Congrats on upping your Boros matchup in the new list. Might just be small numbers but considering what you were saying before, this is considerably better. Any trick to the sideboarding? Everything else looks pretty much where I expected numbers-wise.

I guess I can see your point. I wouldn't play more than two at most though; it clogs up my hand when I draw it as it is.

Wurmcoil is more interesting because it could potentially replace baneslayer. I suppose I feel the difference between 5 and 6 mana (normally a whole turn) is actually quite large in the matches where life-gain is relevent (RDW, tokens etc.). Against tokens, BSA is also the far superior finisher. On the other hand, engine cannot be doom bladed or double bolted effectively, which could be very important.

I might put one in and see when I want to tutor for it instead of BSA.

When the first comment was posted, there were no squadron hawks. Instead, there were 4baneslayer angels, in true mythic style

Frost titan might come in for linvala or baneslayer or even masticore at some point. I tend to feel like tapping down primeval with it is a lost cause. The two extra lands generally give mono-green ramp or valakut all the ammunition and mana they need.

What is this, the "let's see how much money I can waste on Magic" deck? The Llanowar Elves seem out of place, because they're the only thing under $10.