It's probably best against Affinity (EE at 2 blows up all of their good cards) and can also do some work against GW Hatebears, Death & Taxes, and even the G/Bx decks. It's nice because it's an Affinity hoser that isn't completely worthless in other matchups.
It's probably best against Affinity (EE at 2 blows up all of their good cards) and can also do some work against GW Hatebears, Death & Taxes, and even the G/Bx decks. It's nice because it's an Affinity hoser that isn't completely worthless in other matchups.
I currently have an empty slot in my SB and am considering EE. I am also considering Batterskull for the slot.
So are you casting this at 6 mana, and not being dead on board?
I lol'ed. Revelation is the reason I hate playing against this deck, as it usually stabilizes my opponent while refilling their hand. I can't tell you how many times I have someone in lethal range, and then they EoT Revelation, next turn Supreme Verdict, and the following turn Snapcaster Revelation. It's absolutely backbreaking for most midrange decks.
EE is a personal favorite card of mine. Great against Bogel, Affinity, and a handful of other decks. It's not uncommon to get a 3-1 out of it.
I usually cast it for 6 or 7 but you can use it earlier if need be since you can always flash it back later with Snapcaster mage. Rev is better than any walker you could replace it with as it provides and instant speed way to get card advantage and restock on life if you need it. It is very hard not to win after resolving a Rev for more than 6 while a walker taps you out and doesn't always stabilize.
I'm trying to ignore the 10-mana Revelation aspect. Whenever I lose games it's in the first 4 or 5 turns. Revelation for me has been a draw 2 or 3, for the most part.
Most decks in Modern have a fundamental turn of 4. This is why WotC has that turn-3-combo rule and why it's so hard to replace Bloodbraid Elf in Jund. I think running a spell that costs 6 mana to not be embarrassing is costing us. I'm going to attempt to replace the card with Elspeth and Gideon and drop my curve. Now that the deck's died out, mirror matches shouldn't be an issue.
A problem with Control in Legacy is that the card draw spells are all simply cantrips. You can't get ahead on card quantity without paying 3+ mana in a format where games are often decided by turn two or three (Standstill, withholding). The solution for UWx control decks is to run planeswalkers as card advantage engines. Ironically, we actually have access to Elspeth, which is basically the third best planeswalker after Jace and Liliana. Four 4 CMC planeswalkers is the usual number, and that's what I'm going to start with:
I may be off-base with some of my card choices, but it's hard to get enough testing without owning the deck on MODO. Whatever the case, I can't imagine the answer isn't to transition this deck from Wafo's pure draw-go philosophy to something that's more applicable to an eternal format.
In these decks you see about 10 massive card advantage permanents used to pull ahead, with the rest of the deck devoted to library manipulation and disruption. The Landstill deck has 4 Jace, 1 Elspeth, 4 Standstill, and 1 Crucible. The Counter-Top deck has 4 Counterbalance, 3 Jace, 1 Elspeth, and if you've ever been hit with Entreat for 2 or 3 on your end step, you'll know why I count the 2 Entreats.
Contrast this with the current lists we run that have 1 Gideon, 1 Ajani, and I suppose 3 Snapcasters could count? We're playing as if this is Standard and you can just pull ahead when you hit 7+ mana with whatever the current legal Stroke of Genius is. I'm not sure exactly what card advantage engines we should be using, but they should definitely cost at most 4, maybe 5 mana. Maybe Isochron Scepter, Vedalken Shackles, or Crucible of Worlds + miandeck Ghost Quarters? Maybe even swords in versions with 8 or so value creatures? Unfortuantely it's 8 mana to put a sword on a colonnade, but I used to use Feast and Famine in Grixis (Tarpit). If it wasn't for the terrible mistake of Abrupt Decay being printed all these things would be more plausible, but many, such as Scepter, can be activated in response to get you value. There's also the obvious planewalkers like Elspeth. Gideon over Supreme Verdict is an attempt I'm making at not running dead cards, but his damage output can create a lot of scenarios where your opponent is dead to burn plus Gideon and colonnade from double digits.
If you're losing in the first 4-5 turns, you are likely playing the deck wrong. Bolt, Path, Helix, Leak, Snare, Remand, Verdict, Wrath, etc... should be able to get you into the mid-late game. I'm not sure what you're doing wrong, but removing Revelation is going to weaken your deck against a lot of match ups.
The problem with running 2 walkers instead of 2 revelations is that you have to tap out for them main phase. They have essentially the same problem revelation does in that it's awkward casting them early and drawing multiples early. So you have to set up board states where you can cast them: without dying the following turn and still gain value from the walker. There's no force or will or mental misstep to protect them when you're tapped out. Plus those walkers aren't nearly as powerful as Jace. Plus we don't have access to top, so we can't lock people out with counterbalance. Top + counterbalance are useful vs 90% of the decks out there, instead we have to run burn + situational counters. We also don't have the luxury of sitting behind a standstill. Comparing modern and legacy is comparing apples to oranges.
I appreciate the effort you're putting into trying to make this deck better. But it is not that easy. This deck probably won't become tier 1 again, till they print better control cards.
Keep going at it though, maybe you'll break through and create the best version of control.
Also telling time is completely unplayable. Have you played with the card?
Actually I feel the deck's not going to bounce to tier 1 again until the meta shifts in favor of rampant aggro, at least if it wants to adhere purely to WUR-Go design philosophy.
But that's just my outsider's opinion on the matter.
this deck never had that many favorable matchups, affinity preboard, soul sisters, and probably pod pre voice of resurgence, but other than those 3, all other matchups are 50/50 or worse. it was essentially like jund, running the best cards in its colors but at instant speed.
I think gruul aggro is a bad match up, you have very little chance of winning if you don't draw helix, you have removal for their creatures, but you take a lot of damage casting that removal
this deck never had that many favorable matchups, affinity preboard, soul sisters, and probably pod pre voice of resurgence, but other than those 3, all other matchups are 50/50 or worse. it was essentially like jund, running the best cards in its colors but at instant speed.
I think gruul aggro is a bad match up, you have very little chance of winning if you don't draw helix, you have removal for their creatures, but you take a lot of damage casting that removal
Really? I thought it well positioned against aggro if not outright at fault for aggro being reduced to affinity at top tiers, considering how good the removal is against low curve threats, ignoring Goyf.
Though I don't really get what you mean by "take a lot of damage casting that removal" unless you're implying something about Dismember.
you take a lot of damage from your lands trying to cast your spells on curve to kill their creatures. you can occasionally take a turn off against affinity if they don't draw plating or signal pest or ravager. electrolyze isn't that good here like against affinity. and goyf is a huge problem
if you play 4 paths the match up is probably favorable, but trying to burn all their creatures while not dying to lightning bolt is pretty hard without drawing lightning helix
But you'd sandbag with Wall of Omens and/or more wrath effects if Gruul was that big of a problem, no? Focuses a bit too much on one matchup to the detriment of the aggregate, but still...
If you're losing in the first 4-5 turns, you are likely playing the deck wrong. Bolt, Path, Helix, Leak, Snare, Remand, Verdict, Wrath, etc... should be able to get you into the mid-late game. I'm not sure what you're doing wrong, but removing Revelation is going to weaken your deck against a lot of match ups.
By "losing" I don't mean taking lethal damage, I mean your opponent's put you in a nearly unwinnable situation. If you draw better than your opponent you win. If you draw equal to your opponent, may the best man win. If you draw worse? Their deck is going to "do what it's supposed to do" and you're going to be facing down Liliana at 5, Goyf, and Deahtrite on board. Or Tron with 10 mana available and 3 bombs in hand. Or an active birthing pod with Finks on board. One of the best indicators of a deck is it's ability to come back from behind, especially when it's reactive in nature and naturally falls into these situations. Removal is by nature worse than the cards it removes and you need the upper half of your curve to bring you back from the brink; Revelation can only do that if you've succeded in forcing your opponent into topdeck mode. We already have Cryptic Command as the greedy Control bomb that is unbeatable at this point, but merely passable when you're losing.
Also telling time is completely unplayable. Have you played with the card?
I'm still not sure about Telling Time. I originally wanted to try it because of the synergy with Fetchlands, but since the best time to cast it is on turn 2, you don't get to shuffle away that extra card as often as you'd like. The games I've played with it it 's been alright; it's hard to say a card draw instant that cheap is bad since it obviously hits land drops extremely well. It feels terrible to keep a card you don't want to draw and know you have to draw it the next turn, but is that really that bad? If Sleight of Hand was a 2 mana instant, could you run it? Perhaps not.
If it wasn't for the 8 fetchlands I'd probably run Serum Visions like I did in Grixis. I know I definitely am done messing around with Think Twice in Modern. It's great game if you're on the sweeper plan, since you can make a horrendous use of your mana on turn 2 and 3 and then catch up on Tempo. It was pretty embarrassing running Telling Time in the mirror, but that never happens anymore.
Also, for whatever reason, I play a lot against these combo decks, like Tron and Amulet of Vigor. For example, at GP Detroit I played Amulet of Vigor -> Tron -> Tron -> Jund to start out (cleaned up the Tron decks). I'm used to having my deck consist of Cryptic Command + Vendilion Clique + poor draws. The telling time is a lot better in those matchups. As is the third Clique and sideboard Voidmages, which I''m sure you were scratching your head at. Voidmage Prodigy is actually a Counterflux on a 2/1.
Also, why are you guys so adamant about not tapping out for a planeswalker? I can see if you're playing a deck with a combo kill, but with the majority of decks, whatever they play while you're tapped out is going to be worse than the planeswalker.
I'll leave it all at that, though. I haven't had enough chances to test things out since Modern died locally, and you can only go so far on theory. Just sharing my thoughts.
By "losing" I don't mean taking lethal damage, I mean your opponent's put you in a nearly unwinnable situation. If you draw better than your opponent you win. If you draw equal to your opponent, may the best man win. If you draw worse? Their deck is going to "do what it's supposed to do" and you're going to be facing down Liliana at 5, Goyf, and Deahtrite on board. Or Tron with 10 mana available and 3 bombs in hand. Or an active birthing pod with Finks on board. One of the best indicators of a deck is it's ability to come back from behind, especially when it's reactive in nature and naturally falls into these situations. Removal is by nature worse than the cards it removes and you need the upper half of your curve to bring you back from the brink; Revelation can only do that if you've succeded in forcing your opponent into topdeck mode. We already have Cryptic Command as the greedy Control bomb that is unbeatable at this point, but merely passable when you're losing.
You just proved exactly my point. If you end up in any of these situations, you either screwed up or had to mulligan a lot and drew horribly, in which case you are likely to lose anyway. Your opponent should never be able to resolve Deathrite, Goyf and Liliana, or if they do something should have eaten removal. Your opponent should never have a resolved Birthing Pod and have Kitchen Finks on the board. Even if they drop Bird t1 and Pod t2 while you are on the draw, you should be able to stop them from landing another creature (and Finks doesn't lead into a combo with Pod alone, so not sure why that should matter). Tron is the only legitimate example you gave, but they still won't be able to resolve Karn/Wurmcoil through Mana Leak until at least turn 4, and by then you should be able to cast Cryptic.
This deck also doesn't win by putting your opponent into topdeck mode. They win by having more cards in hand (more options), IE Sphinx's Revelation, Think Twice, Snapcaster and Electrolyze. That is why the most desired modes of Cryptic are Counter/Draw. You answer their threat and it replaces itself. You don't want to tap your opponent out or bounce a permanent unless you have to, and even then, you are usually still choosing to draw another card as the other mode.
I'm going to attempt to replace the card with Elspeth and Gideon and drop my curve. Now that the deck's died out, mirror matches shouldn't be an issue.
I've been trying to lower the curve a bit myself for some time, but every time I come up with something I find it doesn't work and end up going back to my old list. I hope that's because I suck at deck building and not because it can be done right because I feel that's where I want to go with this deck. I've been playing Elspeth for a long time now, and I have to say I really like her.
Four 4 CMC planeswalkers is the usual number, and that's what I'm going to start with
I think 4 planeswalkers is probably too much. I play one Elspeth and one Batterskull main and I don't think I'd run another sorcery speed planeswalker/threat. Granted I play one *** and one Burial too, but I think they are necessary unless you know your meta really well. I've played with only one before but eventually went back to 2 wraths main, it's just too easy to get at least a 2 for 1 in most MUs, and it's also too easy to get killed by a goyf you can't kill.
Have you tested Voidmage already? I'm a fan of the card in generla, but I'm not too sure when I would want it in this deck. Is Isochron just for deck that don't run AD?
We're playing as if this is Standard and you can just pull ahead when you hit 7+ mana with whatever the current legal Stroke of Genius is. I'm not sure exactly what card advantage engines we should be using, but they should definitely cost at most 4, maybe 5 mana.
I think the thing is that Modern is closer to standard than to Legacy. The format is centered around creatures which make Planeswalkers not as good if you can't protect them (even then, you're getting a 6/6, or a mini FoF, or a Helix/tap), so you have to pack a big amount of removal, we lack a cheapish counter that works most of the game and we lack good card draw and even filtering.
I agree with Rickster that Telling Time is bad, I've tried it before in other decks and it's just awkward most of the time, and I agree with you that Abrupt Decay kills a lot of things we could be running, but that's just how things are right now.
I was watching MJ stream tempo twin. And his opponent had out spellskite. Spellskite didn't do anything. All it does is stop him from comboing with splinter twin and pestermite, but he's sides out 2 twins, and obviously will never go for the combo if you have spellskite in play. You can't even block with spellskite or it'll just get bolted. I thought it was pretty good in the match up, but if everyone is going to play the tempo version of twin, spellskite seems really bad. Even against burn it's not that great, they can draw a bunch of lava spikes, bumps, or boros charms, or just attack into it and it only prevents 5-6 points of damage, what a great sideboard card. It's obviously insane vs bogle and infect, but those decks are rarely played.
But you'd sandbag with Wall of Omens and/or more wrath effects if Gruul was that big of a problem, no? Focuses a bit too much on one matchup to the detriment of the aggregate, but still...
The deck doesn't have many easy match ups. Even soul sisters is 65/35 at best. There's no 85/15 match up like tron vs melira pod or soul sisters vs burn. The deck has to work very hard to win each game. This is one of the criticisms of the deck. You do all this flash based stuff, maximize your resources and you barely win. It makes you think you're really smart, when in reality you shouldn't have to work that hard to beat an opponent.
I think 4 planeswalkers is probably too much. I play one Elspeth and one Batterskull main and I don't think I'd run another sorcery speed planeswalker/threat. Granted I play one *** and one Burial too, but I think they are necessary unless you know your meta really well. I've played with only one before but eventually went back to 2 wraths main, it's just too easy to get at least a 2 for 1 in most MUs, and it's also too easy to get killed by a goyf you can't kill.
Yeah, my experience with the deck is that you normally keep a "clean board". Elspeth is shaky when you're opponent has multiple creatures out, but a single Tarmogoyf would have to be 5/6 in order to kill the Elspeth with Abrupt Decay on the token. Gideon requires support to deal with Tarmogoyf + another creature, but at the very least he prevents 10+ damage and probably takes the Goyf with him. It's risky running the wraths in the sideboard, but I feel that those are catchup cards better suited for decks that can spend their first few turns drawing cards and fixing mana. Maybe in a UW Control deck with Signets and such, but I think the burn in this deck makes it better suited as a Tempo/Control hybrid. I just had a game the other day where I played Gideon into Elspeth and jumped Gideon for 9 damage. I recall Chapin criticizing Lightning Helix for being dead against creatureless decks (I agree), but then he's got 3 maindeck wraths that are totally dead as opposed to partially.
I think the thing is that Modern is closer to standard than to Legacy. The format is centered around creatures which make Planeswalkers not as good if you can't protect them
Every single damned block R&D prints at least 2 or 3 more ridiculous cards for these Legacy creature decks. Stoneforge, Snapcaster, Deathrite, Young Pyromancer, Abrupt Decay, Liliana, Delver of Secrets (a.k.a. the creature reprint of Black Vise). At this point Legacy's metagame looks sadly close to Modern's; Creature-based midrange/Tempo and the few combo decks that are well positioned against them.
In Legacy Sneak & Show is a deck that is well positioned because it's a slow, yet ridiculously consistent combo that doesn't care about discard. Sound familiar? Tron/Twin Then you have Elves, which can dump it's hand incredibly early and go off through topdecks, even if their Natural Order, a card your instantly dead too, is Thoughtseized. This ring any bells? Affinity All the rest of the decks that are winning tournaments are a bunch of good-card creature decks. Modern decks are all built for fundamental turns at 4, with a few exceptions, like Storm and Affinity. Legacy creature decks for the most part are set up for turn 3, which is where their curves are stopping. A few decks will get you consistently on the second turn, but they're few and far between. R&D hated Reanimator and Dredge out of the format with Deathrite Shaman.
Standard, on the other hand, has essentially no cap on time or mana. Maybe Delver standard put a limit on how long you had to execute your gameplan, but current Standard is nothing but a grind. The best deck just loops Stroke of Genius ad nauseam...Wafo Tapa made this deck in an attempt to recreate this scenario, but he's breaking the fundamental rules of eternal formats. You would need something like Braid of Fire or Grim Monolith to make Revelation a good engine. take this old deck from this article:
Maybe braid of fire combines with Magmaquake or Volcanic Fallout to double-up on spells turns 4 and 5? You could wrath and hold up countermagic that way. You definitely need to wrath if you're going to ramp on turn 2.
Hello everyone, I would like some input on what version of the below or what version of this deck would be the best to take to a modern FNM tommorow. I know this deck isnt what it used to be but it is what I want to play. In any case here is what I am thinking if taking:
My list is similar to your third one and I've been having a good amount of success in local tournaments. I think a lot of that is because I have more experience with this deck than most people have with theirs though, not necessarily because the deck is that good.
Main difference is I only run 3 snaps, 2 paths, no Cliques, no Pyro, and instead play 3 Think Twices, 4 Electrolyze, 3 Snares and one ***. Sideboard is different but always changing, yours looks ok, although 3 RIPs and 2 Stony Silences seem like too much for me. I would definetely play some amount of of Wear // Tear in the side, they do too much.
Try it out, you can always play something different next week.
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It's probably best against Affinity (EE at 2 blows up all of their good cards) and can also do some work against GW Hatebears, Death & Taxes, and even the G/Bx decks. It's nice because it's an Affinity hoser that isn't completely worthless in other matchups.
I currently have an empty slot in my SB and am considering EE. I am also considering Batterskull for the slot.
I lol'ed. Revelation is the reason I hate playing against this deck, as it usually stabilizes my opponent while refilling their hand. I can't tell you how many times I have someone in lethal range, and then they EoT Revelation, next turn Supreme Verdict, and the following turn Snapcaster Revelation. It's absolutely backbreaking for most midrange decks.
EE is a personal favorite card of mine. Great against Bogel, Affinity, and a handful of other decks. It's not uncommon to get a 3-1 out of it.
FREE BLOODBRAID ELF
SphinxRev + pretty much everything with Red in its cost = man I feel like an idiot for sticking to aggro!
Still, doing it for 6 is quite the late game play, I can see what Cipher's implying about making it to 9 lands before keeling over.
I'm trying to ignore the 10-mana Revelation aspect. Whenever I lose games it's in the first 4 or 5 turns. Revelation for me has been a draw 2 or 3, for the most part.
Most decks in Modern have a fundamental turn of 4. This is why WotC has that turn-3-combo rule and why it's so hard to replace Bloodbraid Elf in Jund. I think running a spell that costs 6 mana to not be embarrassing is costing us. I'm going to attempt to replace the card with Elspeth and Gideon and drop my curve. Now that the deck's died out, mirror matches shouldn't be an issue.
A problem with Control in Legacy is that the card draw spells are all simply cantrips. You can't get ahead on card quantity without paying 3+ mana in a format where games are often decided by turn two or three (Standstill, withholding). The solution for UWx control decks is to run planeswalkers as card advantage engines. Ironically, we actually have access to Elspeth, which is basically the third best planeswalker after Jace and Liliana. Four 4 CMC planeswalkers is the usual number, and that's what I'm going to start with:
2 Gideon Jura
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
3 Vendilion Clique
3 Snapcaster Mage
Spells (24)
3 Spell Snare
3 Mana Leak
4 Cryptic Command
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Lightning Helix
2 Path to Exile
3 Electrolyze
3 Telling Time
2 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Arid Mesa
2 Steam Vents
2 Sulfur Falls
2 Hallowed Fountain
4 Celestial Colonnade
1 Sacred Foundry
3 Tectonic Edge
2 Voidmage Prodigy
1 Spellskite
1 Isochron Scepter
2 Counterflux
2 Supreme Verdict
2 Celestial Purge
1 Wear // Tear
1 Damping Matrix
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Sowing Salt
I may be off-base with some of my card choices, but it's hard to get enough testing without owning the deck on MODO. Whatever the case, I can't imagine the answer isn't to transition this deck from Wafo's pure draw-go philosophy to something that's more applicable to an eternal format.
http://www.mtgdecks.net/decks/view/16548
http://www.starcitygames.com/events/coverage/deck_tech_uw_miracles_with_joe.html
In these decks you see about 10 massive card advantage permanents used to pull ahead, with the rest of the deck devoted to library manipulation and disruption. The Landstill deck has 4 Jace, 1 Elspeth, 4 Standstill, and 1 Crucible. The Counter-Top deck has 4 Counterbalance, 3 Jace, 1 Elspeth, and if you've ever been hit with Entreat for 2 or 3 on your end step, you'll know why I count the 2 Entreats.
Contrast this with the current lists we run that have 1 Gideon, 1 Ajani, and I suppose 3 Snapcasters could count? We're playing as if this is Standard and you can just pull ahead when you hit 7+ mana with whatever the current legal Stroke of Genius is. I'm not sure exactly what card advantage engines we should be using, but they should definitely cost at most 4, maybe 5 mana. Maybe Isochron Scepter, Vedalken Shackles, or Crucible of Worlds + miandeck Ghost Quarters? Maybe even swords in versions with 8 or so value creatures? Unfortuantely it's 8 mana to put a sword on a colonnade, but I used to use Feast and Famine in Grixis (Tarpit). If it wasn't for the terrible mistake of Abrupt Decay being printed all these things would be more plausible, but many, such as Scepter, can be activated in response to get you value. There's also the obvious planewalkers like Elspeth. Gideon over Supreme Verdict is an attempt I'm making at not running dead cards, but his damage output can create a lot of scenarios where your opponent is dead to burn plus Gideon and colonnade from double digits.
FREE BLOODBRAID ELF
I appreciate the effort you're putting into trying to make this deck better. But it is not that easy. This deck probably won't become tier 1 again, till they print better control cards.
Keep going at it though, maybe you'll break through and create the best version of control.
Also telling time is completely unplayable. Have you played with the card?
But that's just my outsider's opinion on the matter.
I think gruul aggro is a bad match up, you have very little chance of winning if you don't draw helix, you have removal for their creatures, but you take a lot of damage casting that removal
Really? I thought it well positioned against aggro if not outright at fault for aggro being reduced to affinity at top tiers, considering how good the removal is against low curve threats, ignoring Goyf.
Though I don't really get what you mean by "take a lot of damage casting that removal" unless you're implying something about Dismember.
if you play 4 paths the match up is probably favorable, but trying to burn all their creatures while not dying to lightning bolt is pretty hard without drawing lightning helix
But you'd sandbag with Wall of Omens and/or more wrath effects if Gruul was that big of a problem, no? Focuses a bit too much on one matchup to the detriment of the aggregate, but still...
By "losing" I don't mean taking lethal damage, I mean your opponent's put you in a nearly unwinnable situation. If you draw better than your opponent you win. If you draw equal to your opponent, may the best man win. If you draw worse? Their deck is going to "do what it's supposed to do" and you're going to be facing down Liliana at 5, Goyf, and Deahtrite on board. Or Tron with 10 mana available and 3 bombs in hand. Or an active birthing pod with Finks on board. One of the best indicators of a deck is it's ability to come back from behind, especially when it's reactive in nature and naturally falls into these situations. Removal is by nature worse than the cards it removes and you need the upper half of your curve to bring you back from the brink; Revelation can only do that if you've succeded in forcing your opponent into topdeck mode. We already have Cryptic Command as the greedy Control bomb that is unbeatable at this point, but merely passable when you're losing.
I'm still not sure about Telling Time. I originally wanted to try it because of the synergy with Fetchlands, but since the best time to cast it is on turn 2, you don't get to shuffle away that extra card as often as you'd like. The games I've played with it it 's been alright; it's hard to say a card draw instant that cheap is bad since it obviously hits land drops extremely well. It feels terrible to keep a card you don't want to draw and know you have to draw it the next turn, but is that really that bad? If Sleight of Hand was a 2 mana instant, could you run it? Perhaps not.
If it wasn't for the 8 fetchlands I'd probably run Serum Visions like I did in Grixis. I know I definitely am done messing around with Think Twice in Modern. It's great game if you're on the sweeper plan, since you can make a horrendous use of your mana on turn 2 and 3 and then catch up on Tempo. It was pretty embarrassing running Telling Time in the mirror, but that never happens anymore.
Also, for whatever reason, I play a lot against these combo decks, like Tron and Amulet of Vigor. For example, at GP Detroit I played Amulet of Vigor -> Tron -> Tron -> Jund to start out (cleaned up the Tron decks). I'm used to having my deck consist of Cryptic Command + Vendilion Clique + poor draws. The telling time is a lot better in those matchups. As is the third Clique and sideboard Voidmages, which I''m sure you were scratching your head at. Voidmage Prodigy is actually a Counterflux on a 2/1.
Also, why are you guys so adamant about not tapping out for a planeswalker? I can see if you're playing a deck with a combo kill, but with the majority of decks, whatever they play while you're tapped out is going to be worse than the planeswalker.
I'll leave it all at that, though. I haven't had enough chances to test things out since Modern died locally, and you can only go so far on theory. Just sharing my thoughts.
You just proved exactly my point. If you end up in any of these situations, you either screwed up or had to mulligan a lot and drew horribly, in which case you are likely to lose anyway. Your opponent should never be able to resolve Deathrite, Goyf and Liliana, or if they do something should have eaten removal. Your opponent should never have a resolved Birthing Pod and have Kitchen Finks on the board. Even if they drop Bird t1 and Pod t2 while you are on the draw, you should be able to stop them from landing another creature (and Finks doesn't lead into a combo with Pod alone, so not sure why that should matter). Tron is the only legitimate example you gave, but they still won't be able to resolve Karn/Wurmcoil through Mana Leak until at least turn 4, and by then you should be able to cast Cryptic.
This deck also doesn't win by putting your opponent into topdeck mode. They win by having more cards in hand (more options), IE Sphinx's Revelation, Think Twice, Snapcaster and Electrolyze. That is why the most desired modes of Cryptic are Counter/Draw. You answer their threat and it replaces itself. You don't want to tap your opponent out or bounce a permanent unless you have to, and even then, you are usually still choosing to draw another card as the other mode.
FREE BLOODBRAID ELF
I've been trying to lower the curve a bit myself for some time, but every time I come up with something I find it doesn't work and end up going back to my old list. I hope that's because I suck at deck building and not because it can be done right because I feel that's where I want to go with this deck. I've been playing Elspeth for a long time now, and I have to say I really like her.
I think 4 planeswalkers is probably too much. I play one Elspeth and one Batterskull main and I don't think I'd run another sorcery speed planeswalker/threat. Granted I play one *** and one Burial too, but I think they are necessary unless you know your meta really well. I've played with only one before but eventually went back to 2 wraths main, it's just too easy to get at least a 2 for 1 in most MUs, and it's also too easy to get killed by a goyf you can't kill.
Have you tested Voidmage already? I'm a fan of the card in generla, but I'm not too sure when I would want it in this deck. Is Isochron just for deck that don't run AD?
I think the thing is that Modern is closer to standard than to Legacy. The format is centered around creatures which make Planeswalkers not as good if you can't protect them (even then, you're getting a 6/6, or a mini FoF, or a Helix/tap), so you have to pack a big amount of removal, we lack a cheapish counter that works most of the game and we lack good card draw and even filtering.
I agree with Rickster that Telling Time is bad, I've tried it before in other decks and it's just awkward most of the time, and I agree with you that Abrupt Decay kills a lot of things we could be running, but that's just how things are right now.
The deck doesn't have many easy match ups. Even soul sisters is 65/35 at best. There's no 85/15 match up like tron vs melira pod or soul sisters vs burn. The deck has to work very hard to win each game. This is one of the criticisms of the deck. You do all this flash based stuff, maximize your resources and you barely win. It makes you think you're really smart, when in reality you shouldn't have to work that hard to beat an opponent.
He's going to have to play lands to win - Paul Cheon
Decks:
Standard:
WBWb Weenie/Almost Orzhov AggroWB
UWUW ControlUW
Modern:
UWRUWR ControlUWR
Yeah, my experience with the deck is that you normally keep a "clean board". Elspeth is shaky when you're opponent has multiple creatures out, but a single Tarmogoyf would have to be 5/6 in order to kill the Elspeth with Abrupt Decay on the token. Gideon requires support to deal with Tarmogoyf + another creature, but at the very least he prevents 10+ damage and probably takes the Goyf with him. It's risky running the wraths in the sideboard, but I feel that those are catchup cards better suited for decks that can spend their first few turns drawing cards and fixing mana. Maybe in a UW Control deck with Signets and such, but I think the burn in this deck makes it better suited as a Tempo/Control hybrid. I just had a game the other day where I played Gideon into Elspeth and jumped Gideon for 9 damage. I recall Chapin criticizing Lightning Helix for being dead against creatureless decks (I agree), but then he's got 3 maindeck wraths that are totally dead as opposed to partially.
I'm just trying out different engine cards. I figure I'm safe game 2 to bring it in against most decks where I leave in burn.
Every single damned block R&D prints at least 2 or 3 more ridiculous cards for these Legacy creature decks. Stoneforge, Snapcaster, Deathrite, Young Pyromancer, Abrupt Decay, Liliana, Delver of Secrets (a.k.a. the creature reprint of Black Vise). At this point Legacy's metagame looks sadly close to Modern's; Creature-based midrange/Tempo and the few combo decks that are well positioned against them.
http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/metagame.php?format=Legacy&fecha=2013-11
In Legacy Sneak & Show is a deck that is well positioned because it's a slow, yet ridiculously consistent combo that doesn't care about discard. Sound familiar? Tron/Twin Then you have Elves, which can dump it's hand incredibly early and go off through topdecks, even if their Natural Order, a card your instantly dead too, is Thoughtseized. This ring any bells? Affinity All the rest of the decks that are winning tournaments are a bunch of good-card creature decks. Modern decks are all built for fundamental turns at 4, with a few exceptions, like Storm and Affinity. Legacy creature decks for the most part are set up for turn 3, which is where their curves are stopping. A few decks will get you consistently on the second turn, but they're few and far between. R&D hated Reanimator and Dredge out of the format with Deathrite Shaman.
Standard, on the other hand, has essentially no cap on time or mana. Maybe Delver standard put a limit on how long you had to execute your gameplan, but current Standard is nothing but a grind. The best deck just loops Stroke of Genius ad nauseam...Wafo Tapa made this deck in an attempt to recreate this scenario, but he's breaking the fundamental rules of eternal formats. You would need something like Braid of Fire or Grim Monolith to make Revelation a good engine. take this old deck from this article:
http://www.casualplayers.org/article/get.php?action=getarticle&articleid=322
4 Counterspell
4 Miscalculation
1 Rewind
Creatures (8)
3 Morphling
3 Masticore
2 Palinchron
Removal (8)
4 Treachery
4 Powder Keg
3 Stroke of Genius
Mana (32)
15 Island
4 Faerie Conclave
4 Rishadan Port
4 Dust Bowl
1 Blasted Landscape
4 Grim Monolith
2 Arcane Laboratory
3 Unsummon
1 Submerge
1 Temporal Adept
3 Scrying Glass
4 Annul
1 Masticore
Turn 3 Ætherling with up?
Maybe braid of fire combines with Magmaquake or Volcanic Fallout to double-up on spells turns 4 and 5? You could wrath and hold up countermagic that way. You definitely need to wrath if you're going to ramp on turn 2.
Note: Unknown meta
here are the versions:
1 Glacial Fortress
3 Arid Mesa
4 Celestial Colonnade
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
3 Tectonic Edge
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Pyroclasm
Instants:
4 Cryptic Command
3 Electrolyze
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Lightning Helix
3 Mana Leak
2 Path to Exile
2 Spell Snare
2 Sphinx's Revelation
1 Think Twice
4x Snapcaster Mage
2x Vendilion Clique
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Celestial Purge
2 Counterflux
1 Dispel
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Pyroclasm
3 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
2 Thundermaw Hellkite
1 Glacial Fortress
3 Arid Mesa
4 Celestial Colonnade
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
3 Tectonic Edge
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Pyroclasm
1 Supreme Verdict
Instants:
4 Cryptic Command
3 Electrolyze
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Lightning Helix
3 Mana Leak
2 Path to Exile
2 Spell Snare
2 Sphinx's Revelation
1 Think Twice
2x Vendilion Clique
1 Batterskull
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Celestial Purge
2 Counterflux
1 Dispel
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Pyroclasm
3 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
2 Thundermaw Hellkite
1 Glacial Fortress
3 Arid Mesa
4 Celestial Colonnade
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Island
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Steam Vents
1 Sulfur Falls
3 Tectonic Edge
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Pyroclasm
Instants:
4 Cryptic Command
3 Electrolyze
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Lightning Helix
3 Mana Leak
3 Path to Exile
2 Spell Snare
2 Sphinx's Revelation
1 Think Twice
2x Vendilion Clique
1 Batterskull
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Celestial Purge
2 Counterflux
1 Dispel
1 Hallowed Burial
1 Pyroclasm
3 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
2 Thundermaw Hellkite
Any suggestions as to how any of these lists can be improved is much appreciated as well as constuctive critiscism.
Modern:
RUGScapeshift[RUG...Occasionally with goyfs
RUGTarmotwinRUG(RIP)
Legacy:
UWxuwr miracles and stonebladeUWx
Commander:
UWRShu Yun/Ruhan SmashUWR
Main difference is I only run 3 snaps, 2 paths, no Cliques, no Pyro, and instead play 3 Think Twices, 4 Electrolyze, 3 Snares and one ***. Sideboard is different but always changing, yours looks ok, although 3 RIPs and 2 Stony Silences seem like too much for me. I would definetely play some amount of of Wear // Tear in the side, they do too much.
Try it out, you can always play something different next week.