How does this deck stack up against control decks like Jeskai Control? I'm thinking of dusting off my old Martyr-proc deck and giving it a go at my next FNM.
It depends pretty heavily on the build and how many Planeswalker answers you have, but it can be 50/50. Field and Ghost Quarter answer Colonnade neatly and they don't pressure our life totals, so we can get under them. They typically get their game-ending state online quicker and faster than us, though. I find the BW list does the best, as it has a hard to deal with threat in Blood Baron of Vizkopa and more main deck answers.
Weathered Wayfarer is a really tough cut. I might go down to one in my main, one in the side, but it's too good against Tron to really be considered a major cut target for me.
I run 2 Eidolon of Rhetoric, so I definitely think a second Rule of Law makes sense.
That's my instinct, too. Needle on Vial is very strong against Humans or D&T, but there's a solid chance we'll be on the play against Humans, so Spyglass does functionally the same thing on time. Knowing what Jund/Junk has and being able to name the right thing (Lili vs. Ooze) seems very good.
Speaking of Needle vs. Spyglass, what do you guys think is the better move? Spyglass seems fantastic against UW, but there are a lot of games where we need to hit certain things on turn 2, but not on turn 1.
As long as you have 2-3, you can still get into Strip Mine range, which is where you want to be. At that point, Field of Ruin stops the issue where you're sandbagging lands to always be able to fetch Ghost Quarter with Wayfarer. Too often, we can lose to slowing ourselves down by attacking their mana but they can still cast their nonsense when they get to six lands and if we're not ready to fight that, we lose.
I agree. Blood Moon and Blood Sun are already terrible for us because Emeria is the way we win any non-aggro matchup. They're going to get it down in Game 2 once they see what we do or in Game 1 if they've ever played us before. It hurts us way worse on splash and 3-color builds, but it's an easy way to screw us out of the WW we need for Wrath in mono-colored builds. Less so with Blood Sun, obviously, as Emeria and Mistveil will still let us cast things. In reality, we want people to switch over to Blood Sun from the Blood Moons so badly.
From experience, this is less true for us than most decks. We've got Emeria, Mistveil Plains, GQ, FoR making about half our lands nonbasic right off the bat. To regularly have U by turn 3-4, you'd want roughly 10 sources in our roughly remaining 12 land slots. The upshot is that we may have enough Plains to play W, but there is a non-significant chance of Moon shutting us out of U.
The thing is, my (granted) limited testing says its fine. In most cases, I either use Flagstones to go get Farmland (or Mistveil and a Basic Island if I'm GQing my own Flagstones, which makes sense to do in so many matchups), or I can use Field of Ruin before they get Blood Moon down. I'll give you that my testing is very limited, but it hasn't been any sort of problem yet, as turn 3 is a dead turn if you don't have Ghostly Prison anyway, and that's usually the turn I'm using to Field of Ruin something of their's or fix my mana (With Flagstones and Ghost Quarter, I can do this while still casting Ghostly Prison and by then, I should know how badly I need to save my land destruction for them. In many cases, I don't really.)
I think the light Blue splash feels amazing. Wrath is rarely better than a Verdict and D-Sphere is so much better than O-ring. With Fields and Flagstones, it's been remarkably easy to go find my 1-of Farmland or 1-of Basic Island.
A lot of great suggestions here. As a lot of people know, I've been mixing things up and going away from the traditional build for years, but upon playing the list I posted above, I'm finding the simple version has been the most effective. Field of Ruin is absolutely excellent and Wayfarer should be maindeck even if you're not on a multi-color build, as well. I've yet to hit scary matchups, but so far, I'm 7-0-1 and the only thing I didn't beat was a guy not scooping to me after I illustrated how he would lose. Wins are 2 Titan decks (which I could never beat in the past), A Token deck, a jank tank deck, two Death's Shadow, and Storm.
Sorry for the double post, but I've started to have some serious fear about the possible dominance of Tron thanks to Blood Sun. I'd like to have access to more possibilities for land destruction (which I know seems counter-intutitve since Blood Sun would shut it off, anyway, but it's the option we have.) What do you guys think of this very light Blue splash?
I would also agree about Gideon. If you want to add more ways to win than Serra, 3-drop is pretty much what the deck wants. It can stop combo instantly and still hit for 4 or play the control route by just blanking the decks that are trying to attack with just one creature.
In my list, I run 1 Sun Titan, 1 Big Elsbeth and a sideboard Blood Baron, for reference.
2 Wayfarer feels great to me in a lot of situations because people really target it. Getting your wayfarer Pathed may fix your colors, but it's nice to know there's another one waiting to establish Emeria if that goes that way.
Skynight is interesting. Sky Hussar might be a more consistent value engine, though. You'll be drawing a lot of cards with him and Thraben. In that sense, I might avoid Sphinx's Rev, but I've always wanted to experiment with Rev, too.
I cut Prisons for a while, but everything I put in place of them was never worth it, in my opinion. It's either a brick wall of a blocker in the early game or a completely oppressive "You're going to lose this game" move. It's never bad, even if it's sometimes just okay. Landing two against most decks in the format is a frustrating experience for them and having the out of "Oh, you're a deck that doesn't run a lot of basics and I've got Crucible, Ghost Quarter and Prison in my hand. GG?" is so helpful.
Lots of great conversation going on here. I did not do well at the GP, but it was due to a lot of my draws and misplays more than anything else. I have gone back to no Hawks in response, as my meta is very unfriendly to them and it has allowed me to main Weathered Wayfarer and big Elspeth, which have closed out games in a big way for me recently. Last night, a lot of players (including a Scapeshift player, which has been unfavorable for me.) had to overcommit to kill Wayfarer, which never felt bad. I think, with the meta trying to outgrind us in a lot of ways, Wayfarer gives us an incredible ability to consistently make things happen and it's easily sided out against faster or combo decks. For the person who mentioned the Esper build, which I am on, it's been such a treat to smooth out my colors with it.
As for the discussion about Surgical, I've taken out my Surgical effects, as well (replacing them with Castigate, which has overperformed recently.) Often, unless we have Serra loaded, Tron is going to get to the mana they need against us if we Surgical them off of Tron, whereas Wayfarer or Crucible lock keeps them down for quite a bit. I've won more games thanks to those two than thanks to the Surgicals. I found Extirpate (my surgical effect) was at its best, oddly enough, when it was getting a combo piece or counterspell out of their deck, which means they had to cast at least one. Castigate has provided me a way to sideout narrow removal against them to just rip their biggest threat out of their hand. "Oh, I'm playing Tron and these Orzhov Charms are dead? Bring in Castigate to rip Ugin out of their hand."
As for Sky Hussar and Lingering Souls, I played it for a while in my early days and it seemed to be at its best in the late game, where we are already excellent. Lingering Souls is not as consistent of a damage reducer as Ghostly Prison in my testing and it only really helps you win mid-range races, where I would much rather be casting removal and Wraths to get to the late game. I also found myself discarding cards last night as I was trying to close out, so more card draw wouldn't have really helped in the only match where I think Sky Hussar would have been relevant (which was against an Esper Draw-Go deck.)
Is 3 non-creature hate spells the standard right now? I run four, but would love space for a one-of. Might let main Blood Baron and free up some needed sideboard slots.
Here's my list for context. The only change I might consider is -1 Spell Queller, +1 Aven Mindcensor
Limited printing, unique effect that is really powerful, has eternal application forever.
I don't hit it often, but when I do, it is absurdly powerful. Even when I don't get it, it smooths out mana so easily in my 3-color build. I would crack a fetch every turn if I could.
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It depends pretty heavily on the build and how many Planeswalker answers you have, but it can be 50/50. Field and Ghost Quarter answer Colonnade neatly and they don't pressure our life totals, so we can get under them. They typically get their game-ending state online quicker and faster than us, though. I find the BW list does the best, as it has a hard to deal with threat in Blood Baron of Vizkopa and more main deck answers.
I run 2 Eidolon of Rhetoric, so I definitely think a second Rule of Law makes sense.
The thing is, my (granted) limited testing says its fine. In most cases, I either use Flagstones to go get Farmland (or Mistveil and a Basic Island if I'm GQing my own Flagstones, which makes sense to do in so many matchups), or I can use Field of Ruin before they get Blood Moon down. I'll give you that my testing is very limited, but it hasn't been any sort of problem yet, as turn 3 is a dead turn if you don't have Ghostly Prison anyway, and that's usually the turn I'm using to Field of Ruin something of their's or fix my mana (With Flagstones and Ghost Quarter, I can do this while still casting Ghostly Prison and by then, I should know how badly I need to save my land destruction for them. In many cases, I don't really.)
Here's my mana based for reference
4 Ghost Quarter
4 Flagstones of Trokair
2 Field of Ruin
2 Mistveil Plains
2 Emeria, The Sky Ruin
1 Irrigated Farmland
1 Island
1 Crucible of Worlds
4 Ranger of Eos
4 Serra Ascendant
4 Squadron Hawk
2 Weathered Wayfarer
1 Sun Titan
3 Ghostly Prison
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
1 Crucible of Worlds
2 Wrath of God
2 Supreme Verdict
4 Path to Exile
3 Detention Sphere
2 Proclamation of Rebirth
6 Plains
4 Flagstones of Trokair
2 Field of Ruin
4 Ghost Quarter
2 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
2 Mistveil Plains
2 Irrigated Farmland
1 Island
2 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Eidolon of Rhetoric
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Nevermore
2 Sorcerous Spyglass
2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
In my list, I run 1 Sun Titan, 1 Big Elsbeth and a sideboard Blood Baron, for reference.
Skynight is interesting. Sky Hussar might be a more consistent value engine, though. You'll be drawing a lot of cards with him and Thraben. In that sense, I might avoid Sphinx's Rev, but I've always wanted to experiment with Rev, too.
I cut Prisons for a while, but everything I put in place of them was never worth it, in my opinion. It's either a brick wall of a blocker in the early game or a completely oppressive "You're going to lose this game" move. It's never bad, even if it's sometimes just okay. Landing two against most decks in the format is a frustrating experience for them and having the out of "Oh, you're a deck that doesn't run a lot of basics and I've got Crucible, Ghost Quarter and Prison in my hand. GG?" is so helpful.
As for the discussion about Surgical, I've taken out my Surgical effects, as well (replacing them with Castigate, which has overperformed recently.) Often, unless we have Serra loaded, Tron is going to get to the mana they need against us if we Surgical them off of Tron, whereas Wayfarer or Crucible lock keeps them down for quite a bit. I've won more games thanks to those two than thanks to the Surgicals. I found Extirpate (my surgical effect) was at its best, oddly enough, when it was getting a combo piece or counterspell out of their deck, which means they had to cast at least one. Castigate has provided me a way to sideout narrow removal against them to just rip their biggest threat out of their hand. "Oh, I'm playing Tron and these Orzhov Charms are dead? Bring in Castigate to rip Ugin out of their hand."
As for Sky Hussar and Lingering Souls, I played it for a while in my early days and it seemed to be at its best in the late game, where we are already excellent. Lingering Souls is not as consistent of a damage reducer as Ghostly Prison in my testing and it only really helps you win mid-range races, where I would much rather be casting removal and Wraths to get to the late game. I also found myself discarding cards last night as I was trying to close out, so more card draw wouldn't have really helped in the only match where I think Sky Hussar would have been relevant (which was against an Esper Draw-Go deck.)
Is 3 non-creature hate spells the standard right now? I run four, but would love space for a one-of. Might let main Blood Baron and free up some needed sideboard slots.
Here's my list for context. The only change I might consider is -1 Spell Queller, +1 Aven Mindcensor
4 Ranger of Eos
4 Serra Ascendant
2 Weathered Wayfarer
1 Sun Titan
3 Orzhov Charm
2 Wrath of God
2 Supreme Verdict
4 Path to Exile
2 Anguished Unmaking
2 Proclamation of Rebirth
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
3 Ghostly Prison
2 Detention Sphere
4 Marsh Flats
2 Godless Shrine
4 Ghost Quarter
4 Plains
2 Emeria, the Sky Ruin
2 Mistveil Plains
1 Swamp
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Irrigated Farmland
1 Island
1 Shambling Vent
3 Spell Queller
2 Castigate
2 Stony Silence
2 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1 Blood Baron of Vizkopa
I don't hit it often, but when I do, it is absurdly powerful. Even when I don't get it, it smooths out mana so easily in my 3-color build. I would crack a fetch every turn if I could.