MTG Salvation

The thing is, against those decks, you don't have 3-4 turns, because they can just draw runner-runner and kill you.

Quote from axman »

Quote from ChannelBowlingBall »

Is Geist a sacred cow or have we been trying Spell Queller with more of a flash strategy?

I have begun play testing for the GP using Spell Queller instead of Geist.

It's amazing. Spell Queller is the only reason I'm considering going away from Nahiri Jeskai to Jeskai Flash.

Sure. It's a slower clock "in theory"; however, being an evasive body is huge.
Plus the counter element to the card is super effective.



I took a UWR flash variant to a PPTQ and ended up going 3-3. My only losses were Ad Nasium (drew nut game 3), Elves (bad matchup), and Utron (never saw land destruction, he slave-locked me both games).
It wasn't a bad finish given the fact that my deck was the first rough design I threw together the night before. I didn't have any serum visions for example which really hurt.

I can almost guarantee that if you had been playing Geist over Spell Queller against Ad Naus and U Tron, you would have had a much easier time. Geist is one of the most important cards in the Ad Naus matchup because it puts on a ridiculous clock, where as Spell Queller is just too slow. U Tron also has very few ways with dealing with a Geist, and clocking them (just like their RG cousin) is extremely important. Elves is basically a toss up.

Quote from TheAller »

* Discard spells are NOT terribile in grindy MUs and a good Jund player will NOT board them out;

* I don't know how Goyf, Lily and Fulminator Kolaghan are "easy to beat", need more clarification of that;

* I pointed out Seize and Pulse 'cause you said they can't deal with Elspeth. It's 4 cards vs 1. Plus some Jund players now run Dreadbore in the sideboard because of Nahiri. I'm not saying Elspeth is bad. What I'm saying is she's not enough. Not unbeatable. And I'm not happy where my Jund MU is at. I feel a good Jund pilot has the advantage. We can win, but it's tough and can't really beat their good draws.

* I'm trying out a couple maindeck Dragonlord Ojutai to see how I like them with Minamo and Stronghold;

Discard spells are absolutely abysmal in grindy matchups. They just don't do anything when you're in top deck mode, and the game will certainly get there. I disagree that a good Jund pilot has an advantage, I really do believe that the matchup is 50/50. That isn't to say that they can't have an advantage sometimes. I've played Dragonlord Ojutai previously and it was very medium. The end result didn't really measure up to the cost put into the card.

Thoughtseizes and Inquisitions get sided out form games 2 and 3 because their terrible in grindy matchups. It's also extremely reductionist to make the "they'll just Thoughseize it away" argument because at that point, they can Thoughtseize anything. Your argument for "we need to draw it" is the exact same for Maelstrom Pulse, they play 1, MAYBE 2 in the 75. Fulminator is way easier to beat than people give it credit for. There are plenty of answers to Goyf and Lili to help you bridge the gap to casting your Elspeth, and that matchup is like 50/50 anyway. We don't HAVE to cast Elspeth to win, it's just a good haymaker to have access to.

I think Elspeth is enough against the grindy decks. They just can't beat one if it resolves. I'd also rather play something like Keranos or another grindy threat rather than AV to help those matchups.

I don't know that I really see the argument behind Distortion Strike helping those matchups. The +1/+0 isn't really relevant and the unblockable is rarely relevant in those matchups. I also disagree that Ad Nauseam is a bad matchup, but that's just splitting hairs really.

Blessed Alliance seems pretty medium, I think it has the problem that you believe Grim Lavamancer has. Spell Queller and Unsubstantiate seem interesting though.

Why play it?

I actually played in the Classic as well, and narrowly missed out on Top 32. I plan on doing a report, as usual, at some point over this next week.

Alright, so now that I'm finally taking the time to write up my report, here's the list I played:



Round 1: Josh on Bushwhacker Zoo

I lost game 1, at one point attempting to Izzet Charm a Kird Ape (that doesn't work favorably when they have a Stomping Ground in play) which I attribute to my 3 hours of sleep the night before. I took game 2 after a Spreading Seas on his Stomping Ground and burning him out and game 3 I kept a hand of EE, Lavamancer, Path, Path, Helix, Helix, on the draw with a scry. I thought this would be a reasonable keep, given that it's all removal and I'm on the draw, and two of my removal spells are essentially Time Walks. He played Arid Mesa and passed, I played a tapped Colonnade off of my scry. I drew a UR land of some sort (can't recall if it was a Tarn or Steam Vents) and long story short, I attempted to Helix his Bushwhacker and he blew me out with a Tarfire on his own creature.

0-1

Round 2: Walter on Burn

Lost game 1, won game 2 and in game 3 I was sitting at 5 with a Snapcaster in play, one more in my hand, and a graveyard that included a Dispel and a Helix. He played an Eidolon, which I hit with a Wear//Tear and I went to 3, knowing I had Snap+Dispel/Helix as an option to save me from lethal if he had another spell. I untapped, drew another Snapcaster, played a land and passed. He cast another Eidolon and I missed that I had the line of Snap in response, target Helix, let Eidolon resolve and then Helix it so I let it resolve and prayed for a good topdeck, which ended up being a Helix to win the game.

1-1

Round 3: Josh on UG Infect

This is actually one of my friends that I rode to the event with, so we knew each other's lists as we sat down. I don't really remember the details of the match, but I won it in 2.

2-1

Round 4: Tab on Tron

I knew my opponent was on Tron as I had watched his match against one of my other friends the round before. I ran him over with a Geist game 1, and got him all the way down to 1 in game 2 while I peaked at 27. I just needed 1 more Burn spell to get me there, and couldn't find it after his Ulamog milled a bunch of cards. I lost game 3 to just playing too defensively. I died with 2 Geists in my hand and should have most certainly played one of them. My opponent was at 10 life when when ended the game, so I feel as though my not playing a Geist was a huge contributing factor.

2-2

Round 5: Michael on Grishoalbrand

He comboed off in game 1, all because I tried to Electrolyze him. Game two, I killed him with a Grim Lavamancer. Not a joke. Turn 1 Lavamancer got there (probably should have boarded it out, but I didn't have much to bring in.) Game 3 I pressured him with a Geist and he just couldn't really do anything. I countered all of his Trough the Breaches and he resolved a Nourishing Shoal at one point which bought him some time but didn't matter much.

3-2

Round 6: Morgan on Tron

My opponent mulliganed to 5 both games so this match went pretty well.

4-2,16th place.

I've since chosen to cut the Izzet Charm for a third Colonnade, since I think trying to cast Elspeth off of 23 lands seems a bit risky and I don't really even know that I liked 23 lands anyway. The deck felt like the best build I have played in a while, and I don't really know that I should have lost either of the matches that I did, and really only did so due to a couple of moments of poor decision making. The sideboard plan felt good against everything besides Grishoalbrand, but I don't think that deck is worth devoting dedicated slots to.

I played in a weekly Tuesday Night Modern event last night as well with the following changes:

Main: -1 Izzet Charm, +1 Celestial Colonnade
Side: -1 Crumble to Dust, +1 Kozilek's Return (my area has a bit less Tron and a bit more Affinity. I'd play my 2k sideboard in a more open event.)

I went 4-0 and didn't drop a game until Round 4. My rounds were:

Round 1: Justin on Abzan CoCo
Round 2: Dan on Grixis Control (why do people play this deck? It's so bad)
Round 3: Steven on URWb Thopter Gifts
Round 4: Sam on UG Infect (dropped Game 1)

Deck's great.

I think he's fine against Jund. There's every possibility that they will board out some number of removal spells because they're dead card, and Lavamancer is good when the game goes long. If they kill it, you hardly care.

I don't find it to be win more at all. When it comes to it being good in our good matchups, that is true, but when you look at decks like Burn, Affinity and Infect, while they are great matchups for us, they're very easy to lose out of nowhere because they can be incredibly explosive, and I think Lavamancer helps us there. It also helps against Elves, which is a tough matchup in my opinion, and in matchups like Jund allowing you to do things like Bolt a Goyf a 5/6 Goyf and then shoot it for 2 with Lavaman and shrink it by what you exile from the yard. Obviously that scenario takes a bit of set up, but it's certainly doable. I think the card has certainly earned it's spot as a 1-of, and you should certainly look into testing it.

@TheAller in the event I played in last weekend, I played a turn 1 Lavamancer against Grishoalbrand and that Lavamancer won me the game. It gives us use for the lands in our graveyard and helps clear the way for Geist. It's also great against Infect, Affinity and tokens strategies.

Quote from TheAller »

On Tron, my experience is dramatically different. I barely ever faced a Tron deck that couldn't deal with my Geist (4x Pyroclasm, 3-4x Oblivion Stone, 1-2x Ugin) and actually the creature you want is rather Clique. When I face Tron they always have multiple threats, cause they cycle a lot and have 4x Ancient Stirrings. For me that MU is really just a matter of killing them as fast as possible while taking care of their first, maybe second, threat. Just to have enough time to burn them out after some combat damage. For the record, the MU is bad, simply because in most cases we won't be fast enough to kill them before they go into unfair territory.

This is why I think Mana Leak is better. You actually take care of their threat, not just Think Twice it. When it comes to buying time against Tron, Mana Leak actually does that, because it means that they don't have a threat, where as Remand buys you exactly one turn and never more. And I'm actually kind of to the point where I don't think this matchup is as bad as it used to be. I just think it's a matter of knowing how to play against them. I'd say it's 60-40 in their favor if you're good at playing a Geist deck, knowing what to counter early, etc. I played agianst it twice yesterday and should have certainly won both, only losing my first matchup to some poor decision making. I also think that Resto is better than Clique, but all of our creatures are great in the matchup (maybe barring Snapcaster but he isn't a creature).

Quote from TheAller »

Quote from GreatNateMTG »

I wouldn't call my analysis anti Remand so much as coming to the conclusion that Remand isn't very good right now.[...]

What does that "right now" mean exactly? When was it good then, and what has changed to make it bad all of a sudden?

Apart from that, actually on Burn you are correct, and the way I put it was obviously wrong. My point was to say we can't win that MU with counterspells and the MU is good anyway, so it doesn't influence the choice. I'm not playing one card over the other because of Burn, let's put it this way.

On Tron: why is Leak better? They always have more than 1 threat. You counter one, they have a second one. And often they can pay 3 and just counter your Leak. They can't do that with Remand and again, while time walking them, you're also drawing an additional card that turn, it could be that Bolt that wins you the game. I know you say it could also NOT be that Bolt, but our deck is pretty redundant, you actually have a lot of chances to draw good cards out of Remand.

On the metagame, well in my area the metagame is a bit different and these decks are more than 4.5% of meta share.

And then on this:

-I am playing 4 Leak because I want to try and consistently cast Leak on turn two to facilitate my plan of playing Geist on to an empty board.

Well if you cast Remand on turn 2 the board will still be emtpy...your opponent will have that card in hand, but you will also have an additional card in hand...which one of the two plays is better largely depends on what deck you are facing.

I would say Leak is miles better against Tron. They really aren't that threat dense. Yes, they are a bit more now than they were about 6 months about due to the Eye banning, but they're still not that heavy on win conditions. If I have any opening hand of Geist, Leak, 3 lands and 2 other cards against Tron, I'm keeping it simply because I can wait until they (probably) play their threat on turn 3, Leak it, and play my Geist that they can't interact with. In that matchup, Mana Leak is a far better tempo play.

As far as the empty board portion, obviously the board will be empty after Remand, but then you cast your Geist and they play there guy and then the board isn't empty anymore.

I played in a 54-player 2k today, and finished 16th. I'll post a report tomorrow!