I dropped knightfall for a bit when bloodbraid was unbanned, mostly as a change of pace. I wanted to share some perspective for those of you who (like myself) only really play knightfall.
One thing I found fascinating was how different a hand feels depending on which deck you're on. If you're playing zoo, Noble voice knight 4 lands is pretty borderline (you're probably going to flood and die if you draw another land), but it's a great knightfall hand. I've recently been happy keeping hands that I used to think were bad.
Zoo also got me used to being really really aggressive with my manabase, often taking 7 damage off lands over the course of a game. Obviously that doesn't translate perfectly to knightfall, but honestly I was surprised with what I could get away with. I've moved back to clique recently, and it's been fantastic (similar Mana to the winning Jace list).
If you've only really played knightfall, I strongly recommend trying other decks. My two conclusions were that a) you should almost always keep a seven card hand that can cast it's spells, and b) I was being too cautious with my mana (clique is great!)
Many of those creatures you listed are not actually good intrepid hero targets, not because they don't have 4 power but because siding in the hero is a mistake.
Titan and wurmcoil, for example, mean you're playing against valakut and Tron. Casting a 1/1 for 3 against either of those decks is a good way to die to ugin or scapeshift.
Grixis death shadows creatures have a similar issue. You're hero isn't a threat and is easy to kill. Against us their removal is scarier than their guys. Pro black or sticky creatures are usually better.
I could see hero being good against the old bant eldrazi decks, but walking ballistas from eldrazi Tron change the equation. It's not the worst but I imagine there are better options
I don't think you can compare anafensa to township, they play out completely differently.
That being said I agree with Caleb. No way either version wants that card. If you saw other company decks playing it along side the druid combo, it was probably because it's a piece of the finks combo, which we don't play
Does anyone remember the older iterations of knightfall that were attempting to play clique to improve our flash game and interaction? I remember talking about how there weren't enough good flash creatures to support the game plan (like 100 pages back maybe)
Anyone think nimble obstructionist is worth testing? Obstructionist, queller, and clique form a really powerful team with company and manadorks - evasion and interacting at instant speed.
I had a couple of domri's in my board for a while. They were good against other creature decks (-2 is awesome with knight), but it really wasn't where we want to be against shadow. Doesn't draw enough cards.
Has anyone tried 1GG Nissa? The plants are good at blocking shadows, it can add a ton of power to the board, and ultimating ends games
I've been playing a Naya build for about a week now, basically I found when we cut queller for witness and the druid combo, blue is only really for retreat and sideboard cards.
Haven't missed retreat yet. Knight is good enough alone (and a combo piece with druid), and the cost of adding the enchantment is splashing a whole color.
Do you guys think cunning sparkmage is good enough to be in my sideboard? Or is it so much worse than staticaster that I should just run fiery justice
RPD I completely agree with forge-tender, card is amazing.
Not sure I like the filter land. They're rarely good enough in modern as is, and gate doesn't cast noble or filter with basic forest. Have you tried botanical?
Also I wanted to mention that if your ghost quarter in the board is primarily for Tron, tectonic edge could be better. With a knight, you can get the quarter first and then edge will let you keep them off five lands for tusk or ostone crack. Also doubles as a great card against valakut (GQ isn't great there)
Additionally, queller being "weak to bolt" is actually not an issue at all against burn. If they're bolting your creature it isn't going to your face, so the card they're getting back is pretty similar to the one you countered. Definitely leave queller in.
Also @RPD quick note, forge tender is also excellent against decks with many red creatures like kiln fiend, anger of the gods decks like scred and RG Titan, and dredge (counters conflagrate)
I've heard people call courser "too slow" a couple times now, and I'm not really sure what they're talking about.
We are not infect or burn. We aren't looking to race combo or aggro decks - we would lose every game outside of drawing retreat. We beat those decks by stopping their gameplans with disruptive creatures and then killing them.
So maybe when posters say "too slow" they mean "not disruptive enough"? That's fair, but suggestions like loxodon smiter and Knuckleblade don't really address the issue. Courser is disruptive against burn and other aggro decks as a source of lifegain, clique is disruptive against combo decks as hand disruption, but smiter doesn't disrupt anybody.
We aren't a zoo deck. We're playing 0/4s, counterspells, and zero reach. If you're argument is that we don't want courser because we don't need help against decks where it's good (burn, GBx, bolt decks), then ok. But say that instead.
Hey guys. I don't know if anyone remembers, but if you look at my post history you'll see that I've spent about a month testing Aven Mindcensor in Bant Knightfall. As of this afternoon I have 64 recorded matches with two copies in the Courser/Clique flex spot, and I feel that I'm finally qualified to say: No, do not play Aven Mindcensor.
The theory behind the card was two-fold. As many have stated before, historically it just doesn't DO enough. Many decks don't search their library, its too slow to catch fetches, sometimes they find the card anyway, etc... I theorycrafted that the "decks not searching their library" weakness was shored up by playing Knight of the Reliquary: knight into aven allows you to start tutoring up ghost quarters and strip mine your opponent multiple turns in a row. Additionally, Mindcensor is a flash three-drop, which is huge in a deck with four spell quellers. Between it being excellent against our worst matchups and its synergy with knight and queller, I thought it might be good enough.
The decklist I played with aven was pretty stock, with one big exception. I have not been playing with Kessig Wolf Run or any other red cards, instead opting for a second Ghost Quarter in that utility spot. I will go on the record saying that I don't think we don't need Wolf Run: I've been playing knightfall for seven months now, and not once in 20+ FNMs, 300+ MTGO matches, and multiple SCG Classic finishes have I had a game where I needed it to win with retreat. Additionally, I think Ghost Quarter is amazing in our deck, as it kills manlands and tron pieces, color-fixes in a pinch, and makes knight huge (often a turn 2 4/4 is what you need to win and it's worth stone-raining yourself).
So why isn't Mindcensor worth it? I have found that synergy doesn't make up for the card's inherent weaknesses. There are so many decks that don't care about fetching and also don't mind a stone rain, and tapping your knight to trade lands is often not a good play. Holding up queller and playing a clique is when they pass is always awesome, but if mindcensor is bad against your opponents deck than flashing in a 2/1 flyer is often worse than just having a different card in hand. I sideboarded both copies out against 71% of my opponents, and after rewatching my matches I think that number should have been higher. If you have a metagame full of tron, valakut, chord, and gifts then I could see Mindcensor being a reasonable meta-call, but even then you're gonna be really sad when you get paired against merfolk or ad naus and you have a wind drake in your deck.
Moving forward, I think I'm going to be playing Courser of Kruphix. I loved the card in my pre-queller builds, and Hyper has been putting up good results with it again. It's a bit disappointing that Mindcensor isn't the answer I thought it would be, but I'm glad I put the time into finding out.
The decks that are posting winning results are all playing blue countermagic (negate or will) over disruptive creatures. You need to do this because you can side in your four counterspells against a wide variety of decks, whereas your favorite hatebear will sit in the board more often than not.
Blessed Alliance is great against suicide zoo, infect, kiln fiend, burn, traditional zoo, boggles, even bant eldrazi. Yes you can hit melira off of company, but sometimes you have to consider the wider application of cards. There isn't always a creature that does the job you need it to.
I guess mostly I'm saying that versatility is key. Your sideboard cards should all be used with regularity: we're not a deck with extreme matchups so we can't afford crazy specific bullets (this is the same problem I have with trap over bog and/or surgical)
Ludafish, do you know if he's ever talked about his sideboard configuration? I've noticed its changing a lot - seems like lots of people have different ideas of what they should have in the board.
Can anybody offer some insight on the kitchen finks? I'm also interested in the will/negate split.
Also yeah like I said before I think ravenous trap is bad. I think an overlooked aspect of bojuka bog is that it can be naturally drawn just like a trap, where its usually similar to a sorcery that costs 1 and exiles a graveyard. Knight tutoring for it is a bonus. For example, 1 trap and 1 bog in the board leaves you the same outs to draw hate naturally, while powering up your knights against slower dredge draws
That r/spikes post is interesting. Mostly I'm looking at his sideboard, lots of weird tech in there.
4 reflector mage! Thats not something you see that often, but clearly it worked for him. I've been playing 3x fairgrounds warden in my sideboard, but I could see reflector mage being better? It's kinda close. I might give that a try though.
3 kitchen finks is also interesting. It's not the best card against burn, so is he also looking for help against stuff like jund and grixis? Kinda feels like a weird hedge. I'd like to find out when he brings them in
Finally two ravenous trap, super focused on dredge. I'm used to seeing bojuka bog or surgical: both are referenced in the reddit thread but the OP is convinced that you need extremely targeted hate for the matchup. Honestly, I wonder if tormod's crypt would be enough in that slot. I know its easier to play around, but it also does good work against grishoalbrand, abzan company, living end, and other tier 2/3 decks. Trap is only good against dredge...
Either way, great to see another good result. I'm gonna take this as a sign that we should stay focused on this version of the deck. Seems the list is getting pretty consistent: 22 lands, 9 fetches, 7 dorks, 10 three drops, 2 each of voice, ooze, skite, spirit, and qasali, and 2 retreat
@fatkiddestroyers awesome to hear from you. Looks like you have a ton of experience with the deck. 200 tracked matches is an exciting amount of data too, I'd love to hear if you've noticed any interesting trends.
The point you make about Vendillion Clique is something I've found as well, especially regarding having enough flash threats. I'm not sold on the basic island though: I've found my life total isn't hugely relevant in the matchups where I need a fast clique and island is so bad with voice, qasali, and any draw with a colorless land.
I favor voice over goyf, but I think that might just be because I love the card. I think both have advantages and disadvantages. I've noticed a lot of synergy between voice and queller: opponents are incentivized to play on their turn, meaning they can't just pass back with a company or removal spell up. Also voice in play means killing queller happens only on their turn, which can prevent huge in-combat blowouts. I would generalize by saying that goyf is better against combo decks and voice is better against interaction and combat based decks.
My maindeck and sideboard configuration is fairly different from yours at the moment, mostly because I've been testing Aven Mindcensor over clique, but I can try to offer advice on beating RG titan and Suicide Bloo (I assume those are the decks you're talking about when you say scapeshift and thing in the ice, if I'm wrong my bad haha).
For RG titan I've found that a couple of sideboard cards can really help. Game one is miserable (assuming no mindcensor, not relevant though) but after board I have 3 copies of unified will and 3 copies of burrenton forge-tender. Forge-tender is a card I've been really high on recently, because its amazing against burn, counters conflagrate out of dredge, and keeps you in the game against anger of the gods decks (RG titan, scred, etc). I know your finks/war monk/worship package has a ton of utility in different matchups, but forge-tenders have been awesome for me. Secondly I would say that Scapeshift is the deck where unified will gains the most percentage points over negate. Countering titan is just so huge. You sacrifice in other matchups, but honestly there aren't too many decks where they have more creatures than you but countering non-creatures is important.
Suicide Bloo is tricky. Again, sideboarded forge-tenders are amazing against them since they block kiln fiend, reveler, and swiftspear all day, and can counter a battle-rage kill just by sacrificing and targeting the creature. Aside from that, I notice you're only playing the one spellskite in the maindeck. I've been playing two for a while, and I really like it in this matchup. You get to stop them from using growths and battlerages, meaning your creatures just trade with theirs. Additionally, if the worst happens and they bounce your board, spellskite sticks around and keeps them from killing you with awakened horror. Is there a reason you're just running one skite?
By the way if you're grinding online and winning IQs I assume you probably know all of the technical stuff and interactions I'm mentioning above. I figured I would go into detail because I know other people read the posts. My comments can mostly be boiled down to:
I'm worried that basic island is too awkward for our already awkward manabase
I love voice but I'm willing to switch. Have you started using goyfs yet? Your list is still voice so I assume you've tested both
Burrenton forge-tender is great against the two matchups you're having trouble with and good elsewhere.
Unified will can counter prime time!
Look forward to hearing more from you!
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One thing I found fascinating was how different a hand feels depending on which deck you're on. If you're playing zoo, Noble voice knight 4 lands is pretty borderline (you're probably going to flood and die if you draw another land), but it's a great knightfall hand. I've recently been happy keeping hands that I used to think were bad.
Zoo also got me used to being really really aggressive with my manabase, often taking 7 damage off lands over the course of a game. Obviously that doesn't translate perfectly to knightfall, but honestly I was surprised with what I could get away with. I've moved back to clique recently, and it's been fantastic (similar Mana to the winning Jace list).
If you've only really played knightfall, I strongly recommend trying other decks. My two conclusions were that a) you should almost always keep a seven card hand that can cast it's spells, and b) I was being too cautious with my mana (clique is great!)
Titan and wurmcoil, for example, mean you're playing against valakut and Tron. Casting a 1/1 for 3 against either of those decks is a good way to die to ugin or scapeshift.
Grixis death shadows creatures have a similar issue. You're hero isn't a threat and is easy to kill. Against us their removal is scarier than their guys. Pro black or sticky creatures are usually better.
I could see hero being good against the old bant eldrazi decks, but walking ballistas from eldrazi Tron change the equation. It's not the worst but I imagine there are better options
That being said I agree with Caleb. No way either version wants that card. If you saw other company decks playing it along side the druid combo, it was probably because it's a piece of the finks combo, which we don't play
Anyone think nimble obstructionist is worth testing? Obstructionist, queller, and clique form a really powerful team with company and manadorks - evasion and interacting at instant speed.
Might have legs?
Has anyone tried 1GG Nissa? The plants are good at blocking shadows, it can add a ton of power to the board, and ultimating ends games
Haven't missed retreat yet. Knight is good enough alone (and a combo piece with druid), and the cost of adding the enchantment is splashing a whole color.
Do you guys think cunning sparkmage is good enough to be in my sideboard? Or is it so much worse than staticaster that I should just run fiery justice
Probably isn't strong enough on its own, unfortunately
Not sure I like the filter land. They're rarely good enough in modern as is, and gate doesn't cast noble or filter with basic forest. Have you tried botanical?
Also I wanted to mention that if your ghost quarter in the board is primarily for Tron, tectonic edge could be better. With a knight, you can get the quarter first and then edge will let you keep them off five lands for tusk or ostone crack. Also doubles as a great card against valakut (GQ isn't great there)
Also @RPD quick note, forge tender is also excellent against decks with many red creatures like kiln fiend, anger of the gods decks like scred and RG Titan, and dredge (counters conflagrate)
We are not infect or burn. We aren't looking to race combo or aggro decks - we would lose every game outside of drawing retreat. We beat those decks by stopping their gameplans with disruptive creatures and then killing them.
So maybe when posters say "too slow" they mean "not disruptive enough"? That's fair, but suggestions like loxodon smiter and Knuckleblade don't really address the issue. Courser is disruptive against burn and other aggro decks as a source of lifegain, clique is disruptive against combo decks as hand disruption, but smiter doesn't disrupt anybody.
We aren't a zoo deck. We're playing 0/4s, counterspells, and zero reach. If you're argument is that we don't want courser because we don't need help against decks where it's good (burn, GBx, bolt decks), then ok. But say that instead.
The theory behind the card was two-fold. As many have stated before, historically it just doesn't DO enough. Many decks don't search their library, its too slow to catch fetches, sometimes they find the card anyway, etc... I theorycrafted that the "decks not searching their library" weakness was shored up by playing Knight of the Reliquary: knight into aven allows you to start tutoring up ghost quarters and strip mine your opponent multiple turns in a row. Additionally, Mindcensor is a flash three-drop, which is huge in a deck with four spell quellers. Between it being excellent against our worst matchups and its synergy with knight and queller, I thought it might be good enough.
The decklist I played with aven was pretty stock, with one big exception. I have not been playing with Kessig Wolf Run or any other red cards, instead opting for a second Ghost Quarter in that utility spot. I will go on the record saying that I don't think we don't need Wolf Run: I've been playing knightfall for seven months now, and not once in 20+ FNMs, 300+ MTGO matches, and multiple SCG Classic finishes have I had a game where I needed it to win with retreat. Additionally, I think Ghost Quarter is amazing in our deck, as it kills manlands and tron pieces, color-fixes in a pinch, and makes knight huge (often a turn 2 4/4 is what you need to win and it's worth stone-raining yourself).
So why isn't Mindcensor worth it? I have found that synergy doesn't make up for the card's inherent weaknesses. There are so many decks that don't care about fetching and also don't mind a stone rain, and tapping your knight to trade lands is often not a good play. Holding up queller and playing a clique is when they pass is always awesome, but if mindcensor is bad against your opponents deck than flashing in a 2/1 flyer is often worse than just having a different card in hand. I sideboarded both copies out against 71% of my opponents, and after rewatching my matches I think that number should have been higher. If you have a metagame full of tron, valakut, chord, and gifts then I could see Mindcensor being a reasonable meta-call, but even then you're gonna be really sad when you get paired against merfolk or ad naus and you have a wind drake in your deck.
Moving forward, I think I'm going to be playing Courser of Kruphix. I loved the card in my pre-queller builds, and Hyper has been putting up good results with it again. It's a bit disappointing that Mindcensor isn't the answer I thought it would be, but I'm glad I put the time into finding out.
Blessed Alliance is great against suicide zoo, infect, kiln fiend, burn, traditional zoo, boggles, even bant eldrazi. Yes you can hit melira off of company, but sometimes you have to consider the wider application of cards. There isn't always a creature that does the job you need it to.
I guess mostly I'm saying that versatility is key. Your sideboard cards should all be used with regularity: we're not a deck with extreme matchups so we can't afford crazy specific bullets (this is the same problem I have with trap over bog and/or surgical)
Can anybody offer some insight on the kitchen finks? I'm also interested in the will/negate split.
Also yeah like I said before I think ravenous trap is bad. I think an overlooked aspect of bojuka bog is that it can be naturally drawn just like a trap, where its usually similar to a sorcery that costs 1 and exiles a graveyard. Knight tutoring for it is a bonus. For example, 1 trap and 1 bog in the board leaves you the same outs to draw hate naturally, while powering up your knights against slower dredge draws
4 reflector mage! Thats not something you see that often, but clearly it worked for him. I've been playing 3x fairgrounds warden in my sideboard, but I could see reflector mage being better? It's kinda close. I might give that a try though.
3 kitchen finks is also interesting. It's not the best card against burn, so is he also looking for help against stuff like jund and grixis? Kinda feels like a weird hedge. I'd like to find out when he brings them in
Finally two ravenous trap, super focused on dredge. I'm used to seeing bojuka bog or surgical: both are referenced in the reddit thread but the OP is convinced that you need extremely targeted hate for the matchup. Honestly, I wonder if tormod's crypt would be enough in that slot. I know its easier to play around, but it also does good work against grishoalbrand, abzan company, living end, and other tier 2/3 decks. Trap is only good against dredge...
Either way, great to see another good result. I'm gonna take this as a sign that we should stay focused on this version of the deck. Seems the list is getting pretty consistent: 22 lands, 9 fetches, 7 dorks, 10 three drops, 2 each of voice, ooze, skite, spirit, and qasali, and 2 retreat
The point you make about Vendillion Clique is something I've found as well, especially regarding having enough flash threats. I'm not sold on the basic island though: I've found my life total isn't hugely relevant in the matchups where I need a fast clique and island is so bad with voice, qasali, and any draw with a colorless land.
I favor voice over goyf, but I think that might just be because I love the card. I think both have advantages and disadvantages. I've noticed a lot of synergy between voice and queller: opponents are incentivized to play on their turn, meaning they can't just pass back with a company or removal spell up. Also voice in play means killing queller happens only on their turn, which can prevent huge in-combat blowouts. I would generalize by saying that goyf is better against combo decks and voice is better against interaction and combat based decks.
My maindeck and sideboard configuration is fairly different from yours at the moment, mostly because I've been testing Aven Mindcensor over clique, but I can try to offer advice on beating RG titan and Suicide Bloo (I assume those are the decks you're talking about when you say scapeshift and thing in the ice, if I'm wrong my bad haha).
For RG titan I've found that a couple of sideboard cards can really help. Game one is miserable (assuming no mindcensor, not relevant though) but after board I have 3 copies of unified will and 3 copies of burrenton forge-tender. Forge-tender is a card I've been really high on recently, because its amazing against burn, counters conflagrate out of dredge, and keeps you in the game against anger of the gods decks (RG titan, scred, etc). I know your finks/war monk/worship package has a ton of utility in different matchups, but forge-tenders have been awesome for me. Secondly I would say that Scapeshift is the deck where unified will gains the most percentage points over negate. Countering titan is just so huge. You sacrifice in other matchups, but honestly there aren't too many decks where they have more creatures than you but countering non-creatures is important.
Suicide Bloo is tricky. Again, sideboarded forge-tenders are amazing against them since they block kiln fiend, reveler, and swiftspear all day, and can counter a battle-rage kill just by sacrificing and targeting the creature. Aside from that, I notice you're only playing the one spellskite in the maindeck. I've been playing two for a while, and I really like it in this matchup. You get to stop them from using growths and battlerages, meaning your creatures just trade with theirs. Additionally, if the worst happens and they bounce your board, spellskite sticks around and keeps them from killing you with awakened horror. Is there a reason you're just running one skite?
By the way if you're grinding online and winning IQs I assume you probably know all of the technical stuff and interactions I'm mentioning above. I figured I would go into detail because I know other people read the posts. My comments can mostly be boiled down to:
Look forward to hearing more from you!